Faded Future
by Talentless Muse
Summary: What would you do if you woke up and found that your whole life had been erased? Goku and Vegeta are faced with this question, and must answer it if they ever wish to regain their families and their lives.
1. Chapter One

_To quote the (in)famous Monty Python: "I'm not dead yet."_

_Well, I know people are still checking this story out because I see that the hits are continuing to rise and I still receive the occasional review despite my apparent abandonment of it. Yup, I'm back. Can you believe it?_

_I'm going to go ahead and assume that this is not the sort of update that people were hoping for, but it's what you're getting for now. I actually do intend to finish this, but I first intend to rewrite the entire thing because there are too many things that bother me about the old version to just leave it as it is._

_The first update will be the first five chapters all at once, and after that I'll go to uploading it all chapter by chapter…again. Hopefully we'll get to the end this time._

_I'm not sure if any of my original readership is still out there, hoping for me to finish, but if they are, I'm sorry it's taken me so long. You guys deserve an ending. You'll get it…eventually._

* * *

**Chapter One**

Slipping out of his bedroom and into the darkened hallway, Vegeta quietly made his way along the familiar path towards the training area. He stepped lightly over a creaky floorboard with the ease and familiarity of someone who'd done the same thing countless times before. It was more out of habit that he avoided it rather than out of any actual belief that someone would hear it and wake up. These people slept very soundly.

He passed quickly through the quiet house, pausing briefly and muttering a few irritated curses as he tripped over a pair of Trunks's shoes that lay carelessly discarded on the living room floor. For a brief moment he considered destroying the offending footwear, but he seemed to decide better of it after consideration. It wouldn't be worth listening to Bulma complain about once she discovered the scorched spot on the carpet and found that her son had lost his favorite pair of shoes. Sucking in a breath, he released it with another grumbled curse as he walked off again.

Reaching the gravity room, he opened the door, squinting for a moment as the lights automatically switched on in response to his entering. He blinked a couple of times as they adjusted to the brightness before beginning his early morning workout.

It was a few hours later when he re-emerged from the room, looking no worse for the wear. There was a faint smell of cooking food in the air that told him he'd come out just in time for breakfast. He grabbed a towel that hung by the door and began to wipe away the thin layer of sweat on his skin as he walked back into the main part of the house.

Walking into the kitchen, he noticed Trunks sitting at the table wearing a glazed, half-dead expression as he ate slowly from his plate of food. He frowned in silent disapproval, knowing that the boy had been awake late into the night playing video games. It was becoming an increasingly common occurrence as he grew more interested in the things that other boys his age enjoyed. Overall, Vegeta was rather mixed on how felt about it.

"Hurry up," said Bulma, leaning against the counter and lifting a steaming mug to her lips, the familiar bitter smell telling him that it was coffee. "You don't need to be late for school again."

"Waste of time," grunted Vegeta as he took a seat at the table. He quickly loaded his plate with food and began to eat.

"Education is not a waste of time," sniffed Bulma in an almost indignant tone of voice.

He frowned as he shoveled food into his mouth, pausing in his frightening pace just long enough to retort, "That wasn't what I was saying."

She frowned dubiously at him over the rim of her mug, but her curiosity got the better of her in the end. "What was it then?"

"The idea of school makes enough sense." He took a few more bites of his food before continuing. "Children need to be educated. There's no question about that, but I don't understand why you insist on sending him to this public institution when you have the resources to employ the world's brightest minds to instruct him privately. It seems like doing that would be a far more productive method of educating the boy."

"There's more to school than simply receiving an education. It's just as much a place for developing social skills as it is a place for developing minds," said Bulma, watching Trunks as he continued to mechanically consume his breakfast. She wondered how long it would be before she received a phone call about him falling asleep in class again.

Vegeta frowned thoughtfully, considering her words for a minute. "That seems like even more of a waste."

"You wouldn't understand," sighed Bulma dismissively.

"Why wouldn't I?" he asked defensively, eyes narrowing suspiciously as he tried to decide whether that comment was a veiled insult or not.

"You have no point for comparison," she answered with a casual shrug of her shoulders. "The world that you grew up in was completely different from this one. You can't judge the two in the same way. What would've been useless in to you at his age might be considered absolutely vital here."

As Vegeta grunted and went back to eating, Trunks rose from his seat, trudging out of the kitchen to finish getting ready for school. This conversation probably wasn't going to get any more interesting, which was unfortunate. It hadn't even been all that interesting to begin with.

"He's turning into a human," muttered Vegeta, scowling at the kitchen door his son had disappeared through. Stabbing his food a little more forcefully than necessary, he grimaced slightly as he heard the plate crack.

"He is human. Part of him is, at least," said Bulma, glancing down at the broken plate but saying nothing.

"And part of him is Saiya-jin, but he acts less and less like it every day." He picked up the pieces of what had been his mostly empty plate and dropped it into the trashcan while his fork went into the sink.

"It can't be helped. We live on a human world," she said, setting her empty mug down on the counter. As he walked past her towards the back door, she lightly grabbed onto his arm. He allowed himself to be halted by her. "Which one of us do you think the next one will be more like?"

"I don't know." His dark gaze settled for a moment on the slight bulge in her stomach before rising up to regard the smiling face. "Do you intend to name this one after underwear as well?"

The serious tone of his voice was too much, and she began to laugh. "Is it really that big of a deal to you?"

"I think it's absurd," he grumbled, obviously displeased at being laughed at.

"Well, it is a bit of a tradition in my family."

"My family has a naming tradition as well."

"Fine," she said with a theatrical sigh that earned an irritated glare from the Saiya-jin. "If it's a boy, we'll go with your tradition."

"What if it's a girl?"

"You're not naming a girl after yourself."

"I wasn't planning on doing that," he scoffed, pulling his arm gently out of her grasp. "There are female Saiya-jin names as well, you know."

Bulma sighed in mild relief, wondering why she hadn't considered that he might mean something like that. "You might get that one."

…

Spring came slowly to the mountains. There was still a bit of a chill in the air, and a good many of the mountains still had patches of snow on them. Lying on his back in the soft, new grass, Goku decided that this was probably the nicest time of year.

Closing his eyes and smiling, he listened contentedly to the sounds of the world around him. There were small chirping insects hidden in the grass, and lizards and other reptiles were beginning to scurry about as the slowly warmed in the sun's rays. Birds twittered lightly as they searched for food and built their nests in anticipation of this year's hatchlings. It was peaceful watching the world slowly come back to life.

Peace never seemed to last very long for him. There was always some new crisis popping that needed to be taken care of, but he didn't really mind. This was his home. As long as he had the power to do so, he would protect it.

Eyes snapped open as he sensed a familiar ki signature quickly approaching his position. His smile seemed to change slightly as he realized exactly who it was. It was more excited and intense, displaying a different kind of happiness that what he'd derived from the brief and rare peace he'd just been reveling in. As human as he behaved most of the time, he was still a Saiya-jin beneath it all. The love of battle was in his blood.

He rolled out of the way as a low-level ki blast shot down at him from the sky, scorching the ground where he'd been relaxing. Quickly he rose to his feet, looking in the direction the attack had come from. There was no sign of his attacker.

A second attack sped out towards him from amongst some trees, and he quickly extended one hand to counter the blast with one of his own. He was suddenly thrown forward as a surprise blow struck him in the back, sending him into the oncoming attack. There was a small explosion that sent up a cloud of smoke and dust, momentarily hiding the orange-clad man from view.

He flew out of it, throwing a punch at his attacker, who ducked to the side. The fist only barely grazed the other man's cheek. "You should've been able to dodge that completely, Vegeta," he said as he kicked at the smaller man, who easily jumped over it only to be struck a moment later by another fist.

Sneering back at Goku without any real sense of malice, he responded, "Don't criticize me when you couldn't even tell that I was coming up behind you." He leaned back to avoid a punch, snapping one of his legs up to catch the other man in the jaw.

Recovering quickly, Goku pushed forward with his attack again. "I knew the first one was a decoy."

Their fists collided as Vegeta grew tired of defending. "Sometimes I really do wonder how I lost to you that first time," he muttered dryly. They began to exchange rapid blows, landing a few superficial hits on each other. They weren't fighting at a high enough level to really injure each other, but they still tried to avoid taking hits if they could. It would be dangerous to get into the practice of allowing blows just because they knew it wouldn't hurt them. Real enemies wouldn't bother holding back.

"I got lucky," he said as he caught the smaller man's fist in his hand. Pulling him closer, Goku rammed his knee into Vegeta's stomach.

He gagged as his stomach threatened to eject all of its contents but quickly recovered. "Right. Luck," he grunted dubiously as he wrenched his hand out of the other Saiya-jin's grip and dodging a blow that was aimed for his head. He shot off a small ki blast that was easily swatted away, following it with a kick that dug painfully into his opponent's side.

The pair exchanged a few more blows, the power put into each successive strike slowly increasing as both men became more absorbed in the fight. It was familiar, like picking back up where they'd left off all those years ago when they'd first met. It was also very different from that battle. They no longer faced each other as enemies, throwing blows intended to maim or kill. Instead they were comrades—Vegeta would continue to deny that they were friends—fighting to maintain their skills and for the simple enjoyment. Many things had changed since that first time they'd fought.

Raising one arm to protect his head from a kick that would likely have beheaded a weaker man, Vegeta allowed a small smirk to settle on his lips. With his other hand, he grabbed Goku's ankle, and giving it a hard jerk, he swung the younger man over his head and slammed him into the ground. There was something immensely satisfying about seeing his opponent embedded in the rock. No matter how much of a "good" person he might've become, he would always enjoy doing that.

Lifting himself out of the shallow crater he'd created, Goku spat out a bit of soil and grass that had gotten into his mouth. "I think I swallowed a worm," he commented, spitting a couple more times as though trying to rid himself of a bad taste.

Vegeta's expression twisted into one of disgust. He knew that his dislike—he absolutely refused to acknowledge it as a fear—of worms and other squirmy creatures was irrational. It didn't matter. He just couldn't stand them, and no amount of logic had ever been able to change that.

Having finished trying to get rid of the grit in his mouth, Goku kicked out again, missing the smaller Saiya-jin as he stepped just beyond reach of the leg. Pushing himself up, he threw a small ki attack. When the other man dodged that as well, he had already moved so that he could intercept him. He swung his fist, finally landing a solid hit that sent Vegeta flying backwards across the clearing they fought in. Goku flew after him, shooting more attacks after him.

A blue aura suddenly burst to life around Vegeta's body as he regained control over his flight. The ki orbs racing towards him collided instead with the ground as he shot up into the sky. He threw a quick barrage of energy attacks down at his once foe, who was following him up into the air.

They collided with a ripple of energy that shook the ground below them for miles. They broke apart quickly, only to slam back together a moment later with another loud crash as their energies clashed. Again they separated, one sporting a split lip and the other nursing a bloody nose. Goku smiled; Vegeta smirked. For a third time they charged at each other, making the world tremble, but this time one of the men was sent diving back to the ground.

He ploughed roughly into the ground, creating a crater in the soil and rock as he used his ki to slightly cushion his landing. "Damn it," muttered Vegeta as he sat up, rubbing the side of his head where the blow had landed.

Looking back up into the sky where Goku was waiting for him, he frowned as his vision momentarily blurred and shimmer. He blinked a couple of times and shook his head to clear his vision. Maybe he'd taken that blow to the head a little harder than he'd thought. Rising back to his feet, he shot back up into the sky to continue the fight, but suddenly his vision blurred again, and suddenly the world around him faded to black.


	2. Chapter Two

**Chapter Two**

The first thing that he became aware of as he regained consciousness was the unusual sensation that he was completely submerged and floating in some sort of fluid. His breath caught in his throat as his initial instinct was to panic, but he caught himself as he realized that an oxygen mask had been placed over his nose and mouth, allowing him to breath like normal. Vegeta drew in a couple of deep breaths to confirm this and calm himself.

He opened his eyes, resisting the urge to snap them shut again as a strange greenish-blue liquid flooded into them. At first he could see nothing more than odd, blurry shapes, his eyes unable to focus in the liquid, but he didn't let it bother him too greatly. There were ways around it.

Slowly he began to gather ki around his eyes, pushing out with it and forcing the liquid away so that he would be able to see. When he'd managed to create a suitable air space around his eyes, he began to look around at his surroundings. He was inside some sort of machine with a large clear glass panel over the front of it. There was nothing on the other side of the glass to give him any indication of where he might be. All that greeted him was a blank wall.

Releasing the ki gathered around his eyes, he extended one hand and shot a blast through the front panel of the machine. There was a sound of breaking glass, and the fluid level quickly began to drop. He wasn't going to wait around in some alien fish tank to find out what was going on. He wanted some answers now.

When the liquid level finally dropped low enough that his head was exposed to the air, he pulled the mask off and took a cautious breath, checking to see if the air was safe. It smelled sterile but otherwise breathable. He promptly dropped the mask and looked out through the large hole that he'd created. The room outside of the machine looked chillingly familiar now that it was no longer view through the blue liquid. It reminded him of being aboard Freeza's ship. A chill ran down his spine at that thought, but he quickly dismissed it as impossible. Freeza was long dead.

"Just as impatient as usual," muttered a scratchy voice off to his left. A short reptilian-looking creature wearing a plain white garment appeared in his line of vision a moment later, shooting him a disapproving look. The color drained from Vegeta's face. "I was just about to initiate the draining process. You may be one of Lord Freeza's favored warriors, but that doesn't give you permission to break things whenever you feel like it. This is a piece of precision medical equipment!"

_I must be dreaming_, decided Vegeta as he climbed out of the healing tank. He spotted a small table where some clothing and equipment had been laid out for him and walked over to it. _When I wake up, I'll have to remember to grind Kakarotto's face into the ground._

He frowned as he reached the table, noticing that it seemed a bit tall to him. As he grabbed the clothes, his frown deepened as he saw his hands. They were small, almost soft looking—a child's hands. His limbs too were smaller, thinner, without much defined muscle despite the world-shattering power within them. "Wonderful," he grumbled to himself.

Quickly he dressed, ignoring the lecture that the technician was trying to give him on the proper treatment of medical equipment. He didn't really care. It didn't mean anything.

It was not unusual even now that he would return to Freeza's ship in his dreams. It was annoying. Even though he knew that he was stronger now than any of these people, he would still feel the unpleasant creeping of familiar fears returning to him. He should have moved on from this. These people and places only existed in his memories anymore.

Once he'd finished dressing, Vegeta left the medical room, brushing past the technician, who was still trying to vainly to lecture him. He walked casually down the mostly empty hall, looking around as though waiting for something to happen. So far, that was the only really unusual thing about this dream: nothing had happened yet. Most of his dreams were quite eventful, even if unpleasantly so. He wasn't quite sure what to do in a dream if nothing happened. Did he just wait until he woke up?

Turning out onto one of the main hallways, he was nearly trodden on by a large, dark green creature with rough, bumpy skin and tentacles in place of arms. "Watch it!" snapped the Saiya-jin, shooting a small ki blast at it. The alien was caught off guard and sent skidding a few meters down the hallway, bowling over other men before finally sliding to a stop.

"Little brat," he growled, climbing back onto his feet, but Vegeta had already disappeared down the hall, hidden from view by the many other soldiers who towered over him. "Damn," he muttered as he turned away, but he halted as he came face to face with the angry men he'd been thrown into. "Bastard…"

Continuing to walk along the hall with an aimless gait, Vegeta was not paying proper attention to where he was going. He collided with someone and was knocked to the floor. "You need to pay more attention to where you are walking," said a familiar drawling voice.

Looking up, he scowled as he saw the effeminate countenance of Zarbon frowning disdainfully down at him. "This just keeps getting better and better," he grumbled as he stood back up.

"What did you say?" asked Zarbon, eyes narrowing suspiciously.

"If you were meant to hear it, you would have."

"You would be well-advised to watch your mouth, boy," said the man in a dangerously smooth tone. "Such thoughtless word could get you into very serious trouble if spoken to the wrong person."

"Quit your barking, lap dog. You make threats, but we both know you won't bite without your master's orders."

He was suddenly grabbed by the collar of his armor and hoisted off of his feet. This immediately caught other people's attention, and a few stopped to see what might happen between the two  with shameless curiosity. "Be careful. Talking like that could make you sound rebellious. He is your master too."

"Maybe so," he responded, deciding to play along for the moment, "but I still have teeth of my own."

"You won't have them long if you keep up this behavior."

"More threats, Zarbon? Are words the only weapons you can use on your own?"

"And what are your weapons, monkey?" asked the man, sneering at him in a way that he never would have allowed of himself if he could see how the expression twisted his face. "Your fangs are too small to wound me."

"We'll see," said Vegeta suddenly throwing a ki blast into the pale green face. Zarbon's hold on him was released immediately, and he dropped lightly back onto the floor. "A challenge is a challenge. How'd I do?"

Reaching his hand up to his face, Zarbon ran his fingers lightly over the smooth skin, pausing as they reached a slightly scorched patch on one cheek. Golden eyes glared down at the Saiya-jin, who smirked back at him knowingly. Around them empty space suddenly appeared as the spectators backed away in anticipation of a fight. Wagers began flying back and forth over how long the boy would last before he was beaten and sent back to the medical ward. No one dared to bet that he might win.

"What's going on over here?" Everyone froze at the sound of that voice, and the gamblers fell instantly silent. As one they turned to look at Freeza, who sat comfortably in his hover chair, seeming rather amused by it all.

"Master Freeza," gasped Zarbon, sounding almost apologetic.

Vegeta frowned almost sulkily. Of course something like this would have to happen the moment he was about to have some fun. Dreams could be quite annoying.

"What happened to your face?"

"Sir?" asked Zarbon, seeming surprised and mildly alarmed by the question.

"Your face. There is a mark on it," said Freeza, indicating his cheek. "What happened to it?"

"Ah. Vegeta attacked me."

"You challenged me."

"Only a savage little monkey like you would take that as a challenge," he snorted disdainfully at the boy.

"You told me that I could not wound you. That was clearly a challenge."

"I was merely stating a fact—"

"You mean a fallacy," interrupted Vegeta smugly. "It obviously isn't a fact when the proof is right there on your face."

"A little burn is nothing to boast about, boy."

"It's still a wound. If you'd like, I can give you a second one to match."

"You should—"

"Be silent!" snapped Freeza, punctuating his statement by lashing out with a wave of ki that slammed into the assembled crowd with impossible force, knocking the Saiya-jin and everyone else painfully to the floor.

For a minute Vegeta lay motionless on the floor, his mind unwilling to accept what had just happened. He felt pain in his chest where he'd been struck and in the back of his head where he'd smacked it against the cold tile. It should have been impossible. He shouldn't have been able to feel pain in a dream. _Unless…_

"Get up, Vegeta."

Slowly, reluctantly he obeyed the order, standing up on legs that felt as though they might give out on him at any moment. This couldn't be real. It had to be a horrible, horrible dream. "Sir?" he asked, sounding half-choked as he spoke the word.

"Did you attack Zarbon?"

"He said that I would not be able to injure him. It was a clear challenge to my abilities as—"

"That is not what I asked," he said, cutting the boy off.

He flinched slightly at the harsh tone of the tyrant's voice. For a long moment he remained silent, unwilling to confront the possibility that this might be real. What did it mean if this wasn't a dream? Did it mean that his life on Earth had never happened? Did it mean that none of that had ever existed?

"Well?" asked Freeza, growing impatient with the boy's continued silence.

"It was provoked."

"I don't care." The tone told of irritation about to burst into violence. "Did you or did you not attack and injure Zarbon?"

Injure? That was barely a scratch. "I did."

"I see." His world immediately erupted in pain as a ki blast enveloped his body, burning his skin even through his clothing and armor. It seemed like an eternity passed before it was over. He sank slowly to his knees, thin tendrils of smoke rising from his body. He was thrown flat on his back as the diminutive tyrant suddenly shot out of his chair and slammed his foot into the boy's chest. The armor cracked pathetically under the assault, shattering altogether as the beating continued.

This was no dream; it was no nightmare. This was all too real.


	3. Chapter Three

**Chapter Three**

For a second time in quick succession he awoke submerged in the healing liquid of the rejuvenation chamber, but he felt no inclination to shoot his way out this time. He instead kept his eyes squeezed tightly shut, trying to deny the reality of his situation.

Slowly the fluid began to drain out, taking with it Vegeta's last vain hope that this was some sort of terrible dream that he still might wake up from at any moment. The door of the chamber opened with a mechanical whir, and cold air rushed in, making him shiver slightly. "You can remove the air mask now," said the medical technician before scurrying off to another room.

Reluctantly he opened his eyes and pulled the mask off, drawing in a breath of the cold, recycled air, realizing it for what it really was. This was real. There was no way around that conclusion.

But what did that mean of the Earth? What did it mean of Bulma and Trunks and his unborn child? He was ready to admit that all of this that he was seeing and experiencing now was real, but he was unwilling to entertain the idea that any of that had been fabricated. That had felt just as real as anything he'd experienced here. He'd definitely felt pain then too.

His brow furrowed thoughtfully as he tried to think of something that would satisfactorily explain what had happened. Could some sort of time travel have caused his current situation? It explained how both now and his time on Earth could be real, but it didn't answer questions about why he seemed to be the only one aware that he had shifted through time. There was no chance that he would still be alive if people like Zarbon or Freeza had remembered anything. He didn't mind that they couldn't recall anything of the future while they were still so much stronger than him, but he did wonder why his own memories had been unaffected.

Or maybe they had. Maybe what he thought of as memories were really nothing more than elaborate delusions created by his own dissatisfied subconscious or some punishment imposed on him by the last of a people he'd annihilated.

The first possibility seemed highly unlikely. He doubted that he possessed the sort of imagination necessary to make up even a quarter of the bizarre events that had happened to him. The second event sounded more likely, but he hoped that neither one was true.

Eventually he decided that he would have to get out of the empty rejuvenation chamber sooner or later. Someone else would be brought in to be healed eventually, and he would be forcibly removed if necessary. Climbing resignedly out of the machine, he again walked over to the table where a fresh set of clothes and armor waited for him and began to dress.

Once again he noticed how young and undefined his body looked, and he wondered how old he was. "At the most," he mused, looking over himself once he'd pulled on the bodysuit and boots, "I think that I'd be in my very early teens. Maybe I haven't even quite reached that yet." He'd become so used to measuring time in human terms that it was difficult trying to think in Saiya-jin measurements again.

Hearing the door slide open, he turned warily around to see who it was. There were enough people around here with reason enough to want him dead that he couldn't afford to be off his guard for even a moment.

Nappa and Raditz walked into the room, and he visibly tensed. They saw that the rejuvenation chamber was empty and immediately looked over to where he stood, paused in the middle of pulling on his gloves. "You're finally awake," said Nappa, seeming vaguely relieved to see the boy healed.

_They don't remember anything either_, realized Vegeta, allowing himself to relax slightly. Even though he was stronger than both of them, he would rather not have to fight them now. Still, their lack of remembrance further suggested that the events on Earth had never happened. He looked away from them, pretending to fuss over his gloves to hide his troubled expression, forgetting that the men could still clearly see his tail as it twitched in agitation.

"Prince Vegeta?"

He grabbed the armor piece, staring at it for a long moment. It disgusted him just to look at it and be reminded of all the things it represented. When he wore it, he was marked as something that he had grown to detest, and he did not want to become that again. Reluctantly he pulled it back on. "Nappa, humor me for a minute."

"Alright."

"How old am I?"

"You've forgotten again?" asked the giant man, rolling his eyes and huffing in mock annoyance. "Maybe you should stop asking for so many missions so you wouldn't lose track so often."

"Save me the lecture," retorted the young Saiya-jin flatly. He knew that he was not behaving out of character, but he didn't much care at the moment. More and more his life on Earth was beginning to seem fake. He was miserable. "Just answer the question."

A shadow of concern passed over Nappa's face, but it was gone in a moment. "You reached four cycles not long ago."

A cycle was the rough equivalent of three years in human time. It was the method by which Saiya-jins measured time and age. Being in the beginning of the fourth cycle would put him at about twelve human years old. "About what I thought," he mumbled in a dull tone.

Looking at Raditz for a moment, Vegeta wanted to ask him if he had a younger brother and if he was named Kakarotto. He almost did. He opened his mouth, but before any sound had slipped out, he snapped it shut again. It would be better that he not get his hopes up about anything. At least, it would be better until he found some evidence to give him reason for hope.

The two older Saiya-jins exchanged a glance. Their prince was not acting like himself.

"It's been a while since we've had any free time between missions," commented Raditz in a forced casual tone. "We should head down to the training rooms for a bit. We can—"

"Yeah. Let's go," he agreed, seeming strangely distracted and unenthusiastic.

They walked down the hall in uncomfortable silence. It was obvious that Vegeta was not in the mood to talk. His mind seemed to be elsewhere, and there was little to be done to bring it back.

Reaching the training rooms, the group quickly found an empty one where they would likely not be bothered by other soldiers looking to prove their toughness against them. Because of their reputation as warriors, the Saiya-jins were frequently being challenged to fights under the guise of sparring matches. Many an ill-informed grunt had challenged Vegeta, erroneously thinking him the weakest of the group because of his youth. He'd always seemed to derive a distinct sadistic pleasure from showing them why he was ranked amongst the elite.

Vegeta looked around at the plain room for a moment as though not quite recognizing it before beginning a solitary training exercise. He didn't seem to notice the older Saiya-jins watching him, seeming vaguely confounded by his behavior. It was very unlike him to opt for solo training in favor of actually fighting against someone.

They waited for a moment, but when the boy continued to ignore their presence, the seemed to mutually decide to leave him alone for the moment. Wordlessly the pair began a sparring match, Nappa allowing Raditz to take the offensive to start, but after blocking a few blows, he caught the younger man's fist and flipped him over his shoulder. "You've got to do better than that."

Grunting as he sat up on the floor, Raditz noticed that Vegeta had stopped training and was watching them. He didn't have a chance to say anything before Nappa began to attack, shooting a ki blast that he managed to evade. Quickly he sprang back onto his feet, dodging away from a kick that would've sent him sprawling again. As more blows flew at him, he tried to block or avoid them while always looking for a chance to break through to attack again.

"Keep your shoulder up," rumbled Nappa as his fist slammed into the other Saiya-jin's jaw.

Watching the pair, Vegeta frowned as Raditz began to drop his guard again, and Nappa was quick to take advantage of the opening, barking out a quick bit of advice as he did so. He would recover and adjust to follow the advice for a while, but after a little, he would begin to get sloppy again, and Nappa would hit him again. Raditz was suddenly sent sailing in his direction, propelled by a ki blast that he'd failed to avoid. The smaller Saiya-jin easily ducked around him, allowing him to fly into the wall. "You should've dodged to the right," he remarked without looking back.

"It's easy to say that when you're just watching," grumbled Raditz as he peeled himself off of the wall.

"Are you implying something?"

"I saw you. As soon as Nappa and I started fighting, you stopped training to watch us," he said in an accusatory tone.

"So what?"

"You ignored us just until we started training. It's like you were trying to avoid sparring with us."

"I'm stronger than you two. It wouldn't be much of a match."

"You're pretty sure for not wearing a scouter," said Raditz, sounding insulted at being dismissed so easily even though he knew the boy was right. He had been the stronger one even when they'd first met. It was to be expected since Vegeta was of the royal bloodline and he'd risen from lower class stock. That didn't make it sting any less that a kid who was two cycles his junior could beat him up almost without any effort.

Snorting derisively, Vegeta responded, "I don't need a scouter to tell me I'm stronger than you. I can…" He trailed off with an expression of shocked realization displayed clearly on his face. _I can sense your ki_.

He hadn't immediately realized that he'd been sensing anything because he felt so used to doing it, but he'd been sensing their ki the entire time. It was a skill that he hadn't learned until after his first time on Earth. To retain the ability meant that at least some part of the experience had to have been real. A small spark of hope ignited within him.

Noticing the suddenly stunned look in the child's eyes, Raditz huffed loudly. He didn't like feeling ignored. "What? You can what?"

Opening his mouth, he quickly snapped it shut again, looking at the door with a wary expression. "Damn," he hissed, eyes narrowing as he stared at the door as though it had personally offended him.

A moment later the door slid open, revealing Freeza, still comfortably seated in that ridiculous hover chair, on the other side, flanked as usual by Zarbon and Dodoria. They entered the room, and the Saiya-jins quickly moved together, standing sharply at attention. "Such well-trained monkeys," said Freeza with a small chuckle that made the trio bristle slightly.

Nappa and Raditz glanced at their prince, both wondering how he'd known that Freeza was outside, but now was certainly not the time to question him about it. The tyrant who held their lives in his hand was the last person they wanted to reveal any new special abilities to.

"You are awake at last, I see," said Freeza, smiling at the boy in that familiar predatory way that made the boy want to retch.

"I awoke just a little while ago," said Vegeta, having some difficulty keeping his voice level both from disgust and the almost overwhelming power coming from Freeza. He'd forgotten just how impossible that strength had once seemed, and his stomach seemed to drop into his feet as he reminded himself that this was only a fraction of the full force he was capable of.

"Will you be ready to depart for another mission tomorrow?" he asked despite all of them knowing that it was really an order.

"Of course…sir. I am always ready for a new assignment." It was easier to keep his voice even as he tried to partially block off his ki sense, dulling it until Freeza's power did not feel so suffocating.

"Good, good, I was a bit concerned after the way you behaved at our last meeting," said Freeza, seeming satisfied with the boy's response. "Report to the launch area tomorrow morning. The coordinates and details of your assignment will already be programmed into your ship." Turning around, he and his minions quickly departed. They didn't want to stay among the unwashed masses for too long.

The doors slid closed behind them, and Raditz suddenly turned on the boy. "How did you know he was coming?"

"What?" asked the boy, frowning with a vaguely annoyed expression on his face.

"You knew that Freeza was coming. How did you know when you couldn't even see him?"

"It's none of your business," he answered shortly, looking away from the other two and walking out of the room.


	4. Chapter Four

**Chapter Four**

Dark eyes scanned over the information that had been input into his ships computer with a bored expression, and Vegeta frowned, tilting his head slightly to the left under the unfamiliar weight of the scouter. It felt ridiculous. The red lens sitting over one of his eyes gave him a strange sort of double vision that was quickly giving him a headache. It felt bulkier and weighed heavier on the side of his face than he remembered, and he wondered how hed ever stood wearing one in the first place. Hed only worn it as he was leaving to keep from appearing suspicious.

Theyre worthless anyway. Always getting broken, he mumbled, jerking the scouter off and dropping it in the floor of his space pod.

Opening the door and stepping out onto the new planet, the first thing he noticed about it was the hot, humid air. It seemed to press down heavily on him and made his skin feel sticky. Pressing on an almost invisible button on the outside of the pod, he closed the door.

Massive trees towered overhead, their thick, leafy boughs shading the ground and creating a perpetual twilight except for the occasional shaft of sunlight that managed to filter down through the thick layers of leaves. His ship sat nestled amongst the large roots of one tree, which seemed to have absorbed the impact with minimal damage. It looked like he was in a jungle built for giants.

Stretching out his ki sense, the boy felt a cluster of ki not too far away. It was probably a small-sized settlement. He hesitated for a moment before setting off towards the people, deciding to walk to reserve his ki.

As he drew nearer, he could sense a small group of ki separating from the larger one and beginning to move towards him. It was possible that they had seen his ship and were coming out to investigate what it was, or maybe they already knew. He wasnt the first soldier to be sent to this planet after all.

He began to slow his pace, not wanting to carry out the eradication orders hed been given. These people didnt deserve to be wiped out.

Quickly he shook his head, trying to clear the thought from his mind. He couldnt afford to start thinking that way. These people were going to be killed one way or another. The only difference would be whether his own corpse was added to the pile.

Sensing something off to his side, Vegeta shot into the air and latched onto a large tree branch as a ki blast struck the ground where hed stood. Idiot, he hissed as he scrambled to get a better position on the branch. It was covered in moss and slick from the humid air so that it was difficult to stabilize himself. Forgot to pay attention to their ki signatures.

Looking at the ground, he watched as four dark-skinned figures stepped out from behind the trees and walked over to investigate the spot their attack had hit. He noticed that as they moved the tone of their skin would change to better match the color and pattern of their surroundings. That detail hadnt been in any of the information hed received. It certainly helped explain why thered been so many failures on this mission when the inhabitants werent noted for having especially high power levels.

They began to converse amongst one another, speaking in a language that seemed to consist mainly of guttural grunts and garbled sounds faintly resembled words. He could only hear small bits of what they were saying, but it wasnt enough for the universal translator to make the necessary adjustments. It needed a few clearly spoken sentences before it could begin properly translating. They were keeping their voices too low.

It would be very easy to pick them off from his current position, he realized. They didnt seem to realize where he was, and they werent on their guard. He couldve killed them easily, but he hesitated.

_Damn you, Kakarotto_, he mentally growled, falling back on his usual habit of blaming Goku for everything even though he was no longer certain that person existed. If he did, this certainly was his fault. He never hesitated to kill people, innocent or otherwise, before the brain damaged Saiya-jin had come along.

Clenching his jaw, he extended one hand towards the group and began to channel ki into it. He couldnt be like this. A ki ball slowly began to form in his hand. He couldnt be that person hed become on Earth; not when he didnt know whether it or Goku existed now or ever before. Trying to remain that person was only going to get him killed.

The blast shot from his opened palm, catching one of the men just as he realized that something was coming up behind him and turned to face it. Vegeta frowned grimly as the smoking body fell lifelessly to the ground, and the remaining three men began shouting and gesturing frantically towards him. He didnt need to understand their words to understand what they meant.

He moved to jump from the branch as the men aimed their own ki blasts at him, but he slipped, smacking his chin against the branch as he fell off. Righting himself as he dropped, he landed lightly on his feet, and the three remaining men immediately surrounded him. Each one pointed a blast at him.

One of the men growled something at him. He regarded the man for a moment before responding, I cant understand what youre saying, but the answers probably no.

Again the man growled something at him in that harsh, unpleasant sounding language, as though expecting the boy to understand him if he repeated himself enough times. The ki blast in his hand flared threateningly, but Vegeta made no reaction. It would take a lot more to scare him than anything they could offer.

Discreetly he began to channel ki into his hands, giving no outward indication of what he was doing. He stood motionless with his arms hanging limply at his side, trying to look as unthreatening as possible. Fortunately his small size and soft, childish features made that easy enough to achieve. I have no choice.

Quickly snapping one arm up, he shot his blast at one of the men, hitting him in the stomach. The mans attack was lost, and Vegeta used the opportunity to escape from the other two before they were able to shoot him. It took them a moment to even realize what had happened, and in the time it rook them to fully realize it, the Saiya-jin had already shot off another attack, catching the second man in the side of his head. He frowned as he realized that he hadnt killed either of the men. He was still being soft.

Throwing himself into the men, he began to slowly slip into the old, familiar battle haze. Something in him seemed to shut down, blocking the sights and sounds of battle from his mind, and he fell back in his training and instincts to carry him through the familiar motions. Hed learned to do this as a young child after being sent on his first purging mission. Hed never killed so many people all at once before, and it had been very difficult for him to handle hearing their screams and watching them die. At some point hed just gone numb and found that he could just shut his mind off to keep from having to deal with it. Even once hed gotten older, going back into that numb place had made carrying out missions easier. It wasnt until Freezas influence had really begun to poison him that hed started to actually enjoy the killings.

As the final man fell lifelessly to the ground, Vegeta sped towards the cluster of ki hed felt earlier without pause. He flew into the village, surprising the native people as they got their first glimpse of the latest invader to their world. It seemed impossible that he could pose any real threat to them. He was just a child.

Drawing in a slow breath, the boy looked slowly around the ruined remains of the village and wiped a thin layer of sweat from his face. He tried to not look at all of the corpses. Some of them had been reduced to charred, smoking husks, and others had been so completely incinerated that there seemed to be nothing left of them. He tried not to think about what was floating in the smoky air he was breathing.

There were some bodies however, that had remained relatively intact after his assault on the village. They stared at him with eyes still opened wide in shock and fear, and under their glassy, lifeless gaze he felt guilt. I cant keep this up, he whispered, staring up at the unfamiliar sky. It was blue, he noticed. I have to know if any of it was real.

He would have to finish this mission. There was no way he could get out of it now that hed already begun. Abandoning the mission without good reasonnamely, being on the verge of death or finding out that the planet was about to implode in on itselfwas highly frowned upon. It wasnt often considered a killing offense, but it was worth a severe beating and not being allowed to use the healing tanks.

Still, that would seem like nothing compared to what he was actually planning on doing, but he was willing to take the risk. He had to know.


	5. Chapter Five

_**If you came straight to this chapter, go back to the first one and read through.** They've all been rewritten._

_You know, since I started rewriting this story, I've run into a lot of Dragonball things. I saw some talking key chains on thinkgeek .com, and I've seen a couple of TV ads for the DVDs as well as some kind of cruddy-looking toys. I saw some stuff about the Dragonball DS game and saw a couple of the TV spots. We won't mention the live action movie. I have numerous problems with the way that's being done. I've also heard about and seen a couple of things from that TV special with Taburu/Table. Yeah, I know his relation to Vegeta._

_Seeing all of this is rather nostalgic. Because, you know, there will always be some part of me that still looks back on DBZ fondly._

_However, I won't be bringing Table into the story. This is mostly because it doesn't seem like he'd have any influence on the plot…and because I don't know his characterization._

* * *

**Chapter Five**

Freeza had set up planetary bases all over the galaxy during his time as an overlord. Most of these planets had been cleansed of their original inhabitants before the bases were constructed over the ruins of their civilizations, but there were a few planets where the native people had been allowed to remain relatively untouched. These were people who could perform a specific task that Freeza required, making them valuable enough to keep around—at least for a while. Planet Chamdar was one of those exceptions.

Officially it had been renamed Freeza Planet 63, but other than that and the base that had since been constructed on it, very little had changed from before it was conquered. That was a rare honor, and many people wondered what had warranted such special treatment.

At first glance, the planet seemed like a wholly unremarkable place with no great abundances of any valuable minerals or other resources. It had no great strategic position in relation to other worlds, and the planet's inhabitants were no good as warriors. There had seemed to be no reason why the Ice-jin would even care to acquire the seemingly worthless chunk of rock, much less why the people would be given such special treatment.

Then the rumors began.

The most prevalent and persistent of those rumors was that before the planet had been taken over it had housed extensive history archives. Supposedly the archives had not simply been of their own history but contained the history of the universe and the planets contained within. According to some accounts, they even had records of future events. Of course, this was commonly regarded as nothing more than nonsense.

Now, the people of the planet were responsible for maintaining the main body of Freeza's computer database, which stored information on the planets ranging from the basic coordinates to specific weather patterns. They also kept records of treaties, both current and past, between Freeza and other planetary rulers, detailed star maps, and information on every soldier who worked for the tyrant. The amount of information they had to keep up with on a daily basis and the level of accuracy they managed to maintain was staggering. Even if the history archives were nothing more than a rumor, this was the best place to go to look for the coordinates of a specific planet.

Climbing out of the space pod, Vegeta placed one hand against the smooth outer surface of the ship, still mildly hot from re-entry, as though to steady himself. Although he'd managed to avoid sustaining any serious injuries on the mission, he hadn't come away completely unscathed. His worst injury was a bruised rib. It wasn't worth going to the medical building.

He quickly departed from the landing area, leaving his ship to the attendants and moving towards the soldiers' quarters, a group of large identically constructed buildings. It would be strange if he'd been observed arriving but did not check into the dormitories, and he needed to avoid drawing attention to himself for now.

Stopping at a small building that stood out in front of the large building, he received his room assignment, frowning in mild distaste as he saw where he'd been placed. Although the buildings looked the same on the outside, they varied greatly in appearance on the inside, reflecting the status of the soldiers who were housed within. Low ranking soldiers often shared their rooms with two or three other people and sometimes without enough beds to go between them. Why should he waste resources on cannon fodder? The higher ranked soldiers were allowed to have their own rooms, and if their accommodations were only marginally nicer, they were at least guaranteed a bed to sleep on.

Vegeta walked into the room, quickly removing his cracked armor and tossing it in one corner. His room assignment was somewhere in the middle. Despite being classified as an elite warrior, he was not given full honors because of his youth. It was irritating, but he knew better than to complain about it.

With a sigh he plopped down on the bed, wincing slightly as he jostled his ribs, and stared up at the ceiling. He lay like that for a few minutes, mind wandering aimlessly between thoughts.

There was a light knock on the door. A moment later the door slid open, and a servant walked in carrying a fresh uniform. Out of necessity, Freeza did keep around many people who were useless as warriors. It wasn't just people like the ones who ran the databases. To keep everything running even somewhat smoothly required a massive amount of non-combat personnel from mechanics and technicians to custodians and chefs. Those sorts of people were taken from their home worlds and spread out amongst the many bases under Freeza's control. It was brilliant really; they were so scattered and isolated from one another that they never would have been able to organize well enough to rebel against the tyrant even if they'd been inclined to do so. Not that it would've really mattered if they tried.

Once the servant had left, Vegeta changed into the new clothes, but he didn't put on the armor piece. He frowned, looking at it with a distant expression on his face. "What do I do," he mumbled, gloved fingers brushing lightly over its smooth surface, "if the Earth really doesn't exist?"

Letting out a sharp sigh, he opened the door and walked into the hall, suppressing his ki as he went. He wouldn't think about it.

.

The base was separated from the rest of the planet by a dome that stretched high over the tallest buildings. It was the most confined of Freeza's bases. A hole would open in the top of it to allow ships to take off and land, and there were openings in the wall at the base of the dome for people to pass through in order to reach the rest of the planet. Of course, with such valuable information being stored on the planet, getting to it was not as simple as just walking through.

Each entrance was guarded by an automated security system because Freeza didn't trust his guards than he trusted his potentially rebellious soldiers. The system was equipped with a variety of tools and weapons intended to restrain, incapacitate, or kill the target. The amount of force used depended on how persistent the intruder was, using the same ki detecting technology as the scouters to track the person's actions.

Pushing his ki down to zero, the boy was able to pass through the opening without setting off any of the weapons. He might as well have been invisible. It was difficult to fight back the urge to laugh as he passed so easily through all of those security measures.

"You are quite impressive." Vegeta started slightly at the unexpected voice, and for an instant his control of his ki slipped.

An alarm gave a small beep, and a weapon turned to towards him. It halted, however, as his ki disappeared from its sensors again, turning away after a moment.

Looking around, the boy searched almost frantically for the source of the voice. He was mildly relieved as he saw one of the planet's native inhabitants peeking out at him from behind a large boulder. At least the person had no power to speak of so that it would be an easy enough task to kill the alien if the need arose.

He quickly recovered himself, frowning suspiciously at what he assumed was the male equivalent of this species. "You don't seem surprised to see me."

"Should I be?" it asked innocently, stepping out from behind the rock and taking a few steps towards the boy. The alien was barely taller than Vegeta, and he was thin to the point of looking almost fragile. Its skin was a pale grayish, rather sickly, color that looked even washed out in contrast to the dark color of the garments it wore. "I thought it was quite obvious what you were trying to do, Prince Vegeta."

"You know who I am. You must also know what I am capable of." One hand rose to point palm out at the alien. His expression was conflicted but determined.

"I do."

"I won't be stopped."

"Be careful," cautioned the man. "You are still close enough to set off the security system if you raise your ki again. All of your sneaking will be for nothing if those weapons fire and create a commotion."

Slowly his hand dropped back down to his side, and he regarded the man thoughtfully for a moment. "You know why I'm here?"

"Of course. I've been waiting for you to arrive."

"Waiting?" he asked warily, looking around as though he expected a trap to suddenly spring on him.

"You certainly are paranoid," said the man with a note of amusement in his voice and a faint smile on his lipless mouth. "Not that you aren't at least somewhat justified in it, but, no, this is no trap. Your arrival and purpose was detailed in our other database."

"Other…? The history archives are real?"

"Yes."

Vegeta smirked suddenly at that response. He hadn't really expected those rumors to be true, but he'd thought that it might be worthwhile to make the trip to this planet on the off chance they were. Besides, this planet had the most accurate records, and he'd wanted to be certain he got the correct information. "I would've thought that Freeza would want those destroyed almost as soon as he arrived on the planet."

"He did," answered the man calmly. "We made a poor copy of the records for Freeza and his men to destroy. They'd never seen the original version, so they had no way of knowing that they were destroying false documents instead of the genuine article. We hid the original away, protecting it from him." He turned and begun to walk away. When he'd gone a few feet, he looked back Vegeta as though expecting him to follow, so he did.

"Is it true then that the future is recorded in your database as well?" he asked as he caught up to the man.

"What is the future but history that has yet to occur?"

"Cryptic, but point made," he responded dryly as they continued to walk. "Did Freeza look at some of the fake ones before he destroyed them?"

They reached a building that Vegeta noticed did not seem to have a door, but as the man placed a four-fingered hand against the seemingly solid wall, a door suddenly appeared and swung soundlessly open. He followed the man into the dark building with some amount of reluctance, pausing in a moment of something almost like panic as the door swung closed behind them and vanished into the wall again. "He did, but those ones were largely useless to him. There were just enough tidbits of truth to make him believe that he was looking at our real records."

"He didn't want other people to see them."

"Correct," answered the man as they walked down a long hallway that was dimly lit by faint red lights inserted in alcoves along the wall every few feet.

"He does have some fears then."

"What?" asked the man without comprehension.

"Freeza would like us to think that he fears nothing, but if he truly felt no fear, he wouldn't have felt the need to destroy them," answered Vegeta in a dispassionate tone. "Still, the only thing he would have cause to fear at this point it the entire army uniting against him, and that would only happen if there was someone stronger for them to unite under."

"And how pointless that would be," commented the man as they paused in front of a wall. Again he placed his hand against it, creating another door that they passed through.

For a couple of minutes they walked down another dimly lit corridor in silence. The boy's expression slowly turned from an amused smirk into a suspicious frown. "Why are you helping me? You know perfectly well what it could mean if you were found out."

"You really are quite paranoid, aren't you?" he asked with that same note of amusement in his voice, and Vegeta got the distinct feeling that he was being quietly laughed at. "We have no loyalty to Freeza. The universe is much better without him, and you play an important role in his downfall. That's a good enough reason to help you."

Slowly he mulled over the man's words in his mind, deciding eventually that he would believe it for now. He had no reason not to yet. "I suppose it's too much to expect, but is there any record of a time shift of some sort?"

"There is, actually. You didn't imagine it. I am not aware that it occurred, but your presence here means that it must have. Most people have no memories of the future, but you will find that you are not alone."

"Why do I remember?"

"That detail is…unfortunately hazy. We are here," he said as he placed a hand against another wall. The young Saiya-jin followed him through, silently pleased to know that he had not gone insane and only imagined the events on Earth.

Instead of another hall, they entered a room filled with an enormous computer terminal and a massive viewing screen that hung against the far wall. Vegeta halted as he saw the slowly spinning image of the blue and green planet he'd come to call his home. One corner of his lips quirked upwards in an awkward half-smile as he stared at it.

After a minute, the man shook him out of the daze he seemed to have fallen into. "You are not here to gawk at synthesized images of your adopted planet," he said, shoving a piece of paper into the boy's hands. On it were printed numbers that he recognized after a moment as being the planet's coordinates. "Once you return to the base, you must not leave the planet. Freeza will be arriving her in a few days, and you—"

"Freeza is coming here. Now?" he asked with a suddenly worried expression. It was too big a coincidence that he would just so happen to be on his way to this planet as he was in the middle of treasonous behavior.

"Yes," answered the man, seeming unaware of the boy's unease. "One of our elders called him and told him that there were some technical problems to bring him here."

"Oh," he said, seeming only vaguely reassured by the man's words. He folded the slip of paper and stuffed it into his boot since he had no pockets.

The man frowned, looking over at the boy with an unreadable expression on his gaunt, gray face. "Once Freeza arrives, you'll just need to get him to assign you another mission."

Nodding his head almost absently, Vegeta continued, "I'll need to actually land on the planet, but once I'm there, I can remove the tracking equipment in my ship and fly off to Earth."

"Are you able to remove the machinery while keeping it functional?"

Snorting and looking at him as though he was insulted, the Saiya-jin replied, "I may not be a technical genius, but I know well enough how to make adjustments and basic repairs to my ship." His gaze fell back on the image of the Earth, and his expression began to turn thoughtful and distant.

"You should get going," he said, nudging the boy out of his thoughts. He walked back over to the wall they had come in through. "I'll lead you out since you can't open the doors on your own."

"Right," he mumbled, turning and following the man back into the dimly illuminated halls.

As they walked along in silence, new questions began to bounce around in his head. Why was he going to the Earth? If this time shift had affected everyone and everything, wouldn't the people on Earth be the same as Freeza and the others? Wouldn't they have forgotten as well?

It was possible—although highly unlikely—that someone else on Earth would remember, and if his usual brand of luck held up, it would be someone who was completely useless to him. He grimaced as an image of Mr. Satan and some of the more idiotic humans he'd met during his time on the planet formed in his mind. What would be the use of going there if it didn't put things back to right?

"Wait," he said, stopping and pulling the piece of paper out of his boot.

"What?" asked the man looking back at the boy. He seemed surprised when Vegeta thrust the paper at him.

"Do your history banks say what the cause of the time shift was?"

"I'm afraid that I can't tell you—"

"You don't have to tell me what did it. Just…send me where I can go to change things back." He frowned with an almost pained expression on his face. "That's the most important thing."

For a long moment the man stared at him, the dim light made his expression difficult to decipher. "You need to go there," he said finally, handing the piece of paper back to Vegeta. He turned and continued down the hall again.

* * *

_Well, this it for now. I hope everyone enjoyed it…I also hope that some of my original readership is still out there. If you are, I'd really like to hear from you even if all you want to do is yell at me for not finishing and abandoning the story for over a year and a half. Sorry about that._

_I'll try to have the next chapter up as soon as possible, but I won't say that you should look for it tomorrow or the day after. I'm thinking of trying to do something like monthly updates. That seems like a reasonable schedule to try to stay up with, and if I get a bit ahead…you guys get an extra chapter._


	6. Chapter Six

_This was certainly not how I intended things to work out, but I did say once a month for postings._

_I had this chapter all typed up and ready to be posted a couple of weeks in advance, and I was going to post it on November 1st for everyone to read and enjoy. About a week ago something in my computer became corrupted, and it wouldn't load or let me access any of my files._

_I had to completely reinstall my OS, but I managed to find all of my files and back them up onto a jump drive so that I won't lose them again. That's it for now. Enjoy the chapter. I like how it turned out for the most part._

**Chapter Six**

Drumming his fingers on the arm of the chair impatiently, leaving increasingly deep dents in the arm, Freeza growled, wishing that the spaceship would move faster. Even as the stars whizzed past the large viewing window like bright streaks of light, he mentally tried to urge a little more speed out of the large spacecraft. It felt much too slow.

There was no such thing as a minor technical difficulty when it came to Planet 63 and the computer databases contained on it. The information was far too important for him to consider any malfunction in the machinery "minor".

Was the ship moving slower, or was he imagining it?

Although all of the information stored in the databases was regularly backed up, it would take a great deal of time and effort to restore everything. It had happened once before. He remembered what had happened when one server had crashed, and that had only been small server storing non-vital information. He dreaded to think what it would be like if one of the main servers were to crash.

Now he was certain that the ship was beginning to slow.

It was beginning to decelerate as they closed in on the planet. He growled inn greater frustration even as they drew ever closer to their destination. This was all taking far too long.

He was no longer drumming his fingers on the arm of the chair. Now he was impatiently twisting the piece of metal into an unidentifiable piece of scrap, and in a final act of aggravation just before setting down on the planet's surface, ripped it off of the chair altogether. Mentally he made a note to have the chair replaced with before departing again.

Standing slightly off to the side, Zarbon frowned as he watched his master carelessly toss the torn piece of metal over his shoulder, hitting an unfortunate grunt in the face. The soldier squawked in surprise, clapping a hand over a deep gash on his face as dark blood began to gush out of it. Quickly he stumbled out of the room. Freeza didn't even seem to notice as he continued to stare out the window.

This planet was such a weak point in the empire, but it was necessary that all of the information be organized and stored in some form. Having an entire society of historians organize it all in a huge computer database did seem to be the best option in terms of maintaining accuracy, but it was still an enormous risk. A minor corruption in one bit of data could potentially corrupt or destroy any number of other files. It was a major source of headaches for Freeza, who would drop whatever he was doing immediately to travel to the planet whenever he was informed that there were problems in the system.

Usually he would order a lockdown of the base and the ship while he went to the heart of the system to see what was wrong. Once he saw what needed to be repaired, he would personally go to retrieve the on planet mechanics to fix it. It was unlikely that he would have been called if the problem had to do with anything other than a malfunction with the machinery. Over the years, the planet natives had become quite adept at handling most any other problems that might arise with the system.

It was part of what he most liked and most feared about them: they were so proficient at manipulating the data. What was to stop them from intentionally corrupting the information if they ever felt so inclined? Who would even notice that they'd done anything? They could single-handedly cripple Freeza's entire operation for decades.

He was well aware of it. He was also painfully aware of how much he needed and relied on them. It was infuriating at times, but he dealt with it.

"Sir, would you like Dodoria and I to accompany you, or would you rather we patrol the base while you are engaged?" asked Zarbon as Freeza's hover chair was brought into the room.

"Stay at the base," said Freeza as he rose from his seat. "Make certain that no one is wondering around, and if you do find anyone, I want the person brought to me once I return. Don't kill them right away." He climbed quickly into his hover chair and floated out of the room with Zarbon and Dodoria following close behind in their usual place.

Glancing into the hall as the trio passed by, Nappa scowled thoughtfully at their retreating backs before turning away to regard Raditz, who was sharing the room with him. A moment later the door slid closed and locked with a surprisingly loud noise. "This place again," he murmured, sitting down on one of the beds in the small room.

"Again? It's been a while since he last came out here," corrected Raditz from where he lay on the other bed, staring up at the ceiling.

"That we know of. He still comes to this planet more than any of the other worlds he's kept."

Raditz shrugged, seeming overall unconcerned. "They got important stuff here."

Snorting in annoyance, he said, "If it's so damn important, why don't they divide it up onto different planets?"

He looked at the door, staring through it and across the hall at the empty room that Vegeta had been assigned to while aboard the ship. The boy was one of the few people on board who had a room to himself. In such limited space there were few who were given such a privilege, but for him, it was no favor. It isolated him and made the other men jealous that he would be treated so well. It didn't matter that none of them would have roomed with him anyway; they hated him for it.

"Maybe he doesn't split it up because he thinks it'd be easier for someone to sneak in and mess something up," he suggested flatly, continuing to stare at the metal paneling of the ceiling with the most apathetic expression he could muster.

Grunting noncommittally as he turned his gaze towards the floor, Nappa rubbed one hand over his bald head. Sometimes he still expected to feel spiky hair instead of smooth scalp.

"You're stating to sound like you got a brain in there."

"Be quiet."

"What? Weren't you trying to make yourself out to be an idiot so no one would think too much of you and so Freeza wouldn't feel like killing you?"

He scowled at the other Saiya-jin, not amused. "I don't do it for myself. You know that. I only act the fool to protect you and Prince Vegeta."

"I don't need protection!" he exclaimed, sitting up suddenly and glaring at the large man as though insulted. "I'm not a cub. I'm a man, you know."

"Barely," snorted Nappa in amusement. Dark eyes narrowed at him angrily. "You're still only just six cycles old. Don't get too carried away thinking you're all grown up just because of that."

Folding his arms over his chest and huffing irritably, Raditz grumbled something under his breath, not seeming to realize how childish his actions appeared. He certainly didn't look like a man when he was sitting on his bed sulking, and for a long moment they did not speak. "Vegeta doesn't need your protection either. He was stronger than both of us from the beginning."

"Maybe so, but I swore to protect him the best I could. That's what I'll do."

"The person you made that promise to is dead."

"I didn't make that promise to just his father. I swore it to myself as well."

Another silence passed between them, long and uncomfortable. "You can't protect him forever," said Raditz in an almost bitter tone as he stared down his cot.

"I know."

"Freeza wants him."

"I know."

"He's gonna take Vegeta; he's gonna turn him into a monster."

"I know!" roared Nappa furiously, rising to his full height and towering over the younger man, who suddenly seemed to fear for his safety. After a moment, however, he dropped back onto the bed, shoulders sagging in defeat. "I know."

…

The problem had not been difficult to fix, but in that vast maze of computer systems it had taken hours to simply track it down. Despite the annoyance of so much time wasted for only a minor repair, Freeza would rather deal with that inconvenience than risk losing all of the compiled information. Still, after all of that, he wanted to kill something.

Or at least maim it.

It was unfortunate that Vegeta was still away on that purge mission. He made such a wonderful punching bag. It was always entertaining to watch him struggle.

Slowly he floated back through the gates, returning to the base. The security defenses had been programmed to ignore his ki signature so that he could pass through without any need to shut off the system. Even if it hadn't been programmed that way, the weapons wouldn't have been capable of injuring him, but it would have been annoying to have them begin firing at him every time he passed through.

"Dammit! Let me go!" He frowned at the sound of the familiar voice.

"Stop flailing like that. You know that you can't get away," responded the equally familiar drawling voice of Zarbon.

"I can walk on my own!"

"Not if I break those legs," grumbled the man in an exasperated tone.

"Big talk, lap dog."

"Brainless monkey."

A moment later Zarbon walked around the corner of a nearby building, carrying the struggling form of Vegeta tucked under one arm. The boy seemed to realize immediately that Freeza was there, falling silent and looking at him without any expression of surprise. He was mildly surprised by that reaction, but he supposed that he shouldn't be. As much as they made fun of the Saiya-jins intelligence, the boy was smart enough to realize that Zarbon's presence likely meant his presence as well.

"Lord Freeza!" exclaimed Zarbon, only having just noticed his master. Dark lips twisted slightly in disapproval.

"What's this?"

"Oh." Quickly he released the child, dropping him unceremoniously on the ground. "Sir, I found Vegeta wandering the streets during the lockdown, and I was bringing him to you, as commanded."

Vegeta frowned as he stood back up, crossing his arms over his chest and trying to maintain some appearance of dignity. "I wasn't wandering the streets. I was sitting outside one of the locked buildings when he came along."

"You could tell I was coming."

"I'm not wearing a scouter," he retorted, pointing at his face, wearing an expression that said quite clearly he thought the man an idiot, and for just a moment, Freeza seemed to be of the same opinion. "I couldn't have known you were coming until you were visible, and you would've been able to see me by then too."

For a moment Freeza stared at him silently, contemplatively. "Why were you outside?"

The boy briefly made a face like he'd been struck, but he quickly drew himself up, pulling in every last shred of pride that he could, trying to shield himself with it. "I was eating in the cafeteria when the lockdown was announced. Some idiots decided that it would be a good joke, so they grabbed me and threw me outside just before everything was locked. That's where I was when Zarbon came."

An amused smirk stretched the tyrant's lips, and he raised a hand to hide his mouth as he chuckled lightly. "Poor Vegeta," he said without and sympathy. "It must be horrible to be made a joke of"

He clung tightly to his pride, refusing to be wounded. "It doesn't matter. They won't laugh for long."

"But weren't they just strong enough to throw you out before?"

"They got lucky!" he snapped bitterly.

"I see," mused Freeza calmly, eyes lowering to regard the boy's tail wrapped snugly around his waist. They had indeed been quite lucky to catch a hold of that, but they were incredibly unlucky for ever having let it go. "Well, I suppose we can let that one pass then."

Now it was Zarbon who looked as though he'd been struck, punched in the gut by his master's unexpected leniency with the boy. "Sir, how can you be certain that he's telling the truth?"

"Are you questioning me?"

The color seemed to drain from his face, and quickly diverted his fearful gaze to the ground. Vegeta watched him with undisguised glee. "No, sir. Of course not."

"Good." He turned his attention back to the Saiya-jin, whose expression quickly turned serious again. "Now, Vegeta, you have explained why you were outside, but you have not explained why you are on this planet. The base closest to your assignment is at least a couple days travel from here."

"I know. I was there when I heard that you were coming to this planet," he answered calmly. He wasn't going to be intimidated. "I wanted to request another mission."

"Another mission?" asked Freeza with an indistinct expression. "So you are back to yourself. Before you departed on that last assignment, I wondered if you had lost the will to fight. You were so submissive, letting me beat you without even a bit of resistance."

"I haven't given up."

"Would you try to fight back if I were to strike you now?"

He fought back the urge to scoff at the question. He knew that he would be struck no matter how he answered the question. "There's only one way to find out."

Suddenly a fist slammed into his face and he tumbled back across the ground. Rolling as he began to slow and flipping easily back onto his feet, he recovered quickly. Blood gushed out of his nose, throbbing painfully, but he could tell well enough that it wasn't broken. That blow had not bean meant to break anything.

Wiping the blood away, he looked back at Freeza, frowning as he saw the empty hover chair and Zarbon smirking shamelessly at him, but he'd expected as much. He looked around as though trying to find the Ice-jin, reaching out with his ki sense at the same time, easily finding and following the massive power. He leapt to the side just as Freeza's foot slammed into the ground where he'd stood, and as he flew away, trying vainly to put some distance between them, he shot a pair of ki blasts that the tyrant easily avoided. Silently he cursed. He was even more helpless than he'd been when fighting on Namek.

Freeza rushed at him, slamming his knee into Vegeta's stomach, and the boy dropped, doubled over, gagging and heaving. He rolled back as another blow came at him, bracing his hands against the ground and pushing up into the air. Still fighting back the urge to vomit, he fired a quick barrage of ki blasts at the ground, creating a large cloud of dust and smoke that hid him from view.

Suppressing his ki, he dropped back to the ground, landing a little harder than he would've preferred. "Where is he?" He smirked slightly as he heard Freeza shouting. Panting slightly, he darted through the smoke, deciding that it would be unwise to stay in one place even if they were ki blind.

"H-his power vanished!" exclaimed Zarbon in shock. "The scouter can't find him!"

"Impossible!" It was almost too much to resist laughing.

As the smoke began to thin, he could start to make out their shapes as they searched for him. Freeza was shooting small ki blasts in random directions—a couple of them came very close to hitting him—while Zarbon desperately pushed the scan button on his scouter, cursing in his native language. Waiting for a moment longer, he suddenly darted towards them, shooting a ki blast at the distracted tyrant. He smirked as he saw the shocked expression on Freeza's face as he turned just in time to be caught by the attack. Just hitting him was an accomplishment. He couldn't hope to actually injure the man, yet.

Sensing his ki beginning to build, Vegeta tried to dart out of the way of the blast. It shot towards him, and he only just managed to pull out of its path in time to avoid being directly hit. It crashed into the ground, creating a shockwave that knocked him off of his feet and sent him sliding across the ground. "How did you do that?"

"Do what?" he asked as he pushed himself slowly back up. His ribs throbbed in a painful reminder of his still healing injury.

Freeza suddenly snatched him up by the collar of his shirt and slammed him roughly into the nearest wall. He winced slightly at the jarring motion but gave no other indication of pain. "Don't try to play dumb with me. How did you make your power level vanish?"

"I don't know what you're talking about," answered the boy, trying to seem genuinely confounded by the question. He hadn't thought about it, forgetting how strange his ability to hide his ki would seem; how much it would stand out. Mentally he cursed again for that lapse in forethought.

For a long moment Freeza glared at him, waiting for him to crack, but suddenly he released the boy, allowing to drop back onto the ground. "Perhaps," he murmured thoughtfully, dark painted lips pulled into a frown. His gaze was calculating as he watched the young Saiya-jin rise again to his feet. "Perhaps it was simply a fluke. Besides, what good would trying to hide from me do if I was really trying to kill you?"

Vegeta's expression remained neutral even as the mocking questioned summoned memories of his death at the tyrant's hands. With some effort he suppressed a shudder that threatened to give him away. "None, sir."

A hand rose to his face, patting his cheek lightly. He wanted to flinch away from the touch, but he knew that he couldn't. It would only make things worse if he tried. Finally the hand pulled away, fingers dragging lightly along his jaw before leaving completely. The memory of the touch itched and burned on his skin, but he forced his expression to remain calm.

Seeming satisfied for the moment, Freeza turned away and returned to his hover chair. He glanced back, smirking again. "I will have another mission for you within a couple of days."

"Yes, sir," he said, forcing himself to bow, staring infuriated at the ground.

"Return to the ship and allow the men on board to leave," said Freeza, turning his attention to Zarbon, who seemed distinctly disappointed that it was over with so little of the Saiya-jin's blood spilled. Amusement evident on his face, the tyrant began to float off down the base's central street. "Ah, but make certain to remind them what will happen if they try to go beyond the base limits."

"Of course, Master Freeza," said Zarbon, bowing deeply and graciously to the Ice-jin's departing form. Straightening back up, he shot a glare at the boy before lifting into the air and flying off towards the landing area.

"Kiss ass," he muttered disdainfully. Looking after him, he frowned thoughtfully, wondering if Nappa and Raditz might still be in the ship. After a moment of consideration, he also flew towards the ship, not quite certain why he wanted to see if they were there.

…

Leaning against the wall of a building just out of sight of the ship, he waited. The door opened with a hiss of hydraulics, and a group of soldiers spilled out, eager to escape the confined quarters and their fellow soldiers. Some of them headed straight off to the dormitories, but most of the men went to the bar. He frowned as his sense brushed over them, feeling only unfamiliar ki signatures. It didn't seem like Nappa and Raditz were among them.

He'd felt their signatures only once before, so he couldn't be entirely certain that he would recognize them right away. They would likely at least feel somewhat familiar.

People were still exiting the ship. They weren't in large crowds like that first group who'd been in a rush to get onto the base. None of them were his fellow Saiya-jins, so he ignored them. He was beginning to wonder if they hadn't been sent out on another mission as well. For some reason, he didn't like that idea.

A smirk stretched across his lips as he sensed a pair of ki exiting the ships. There they were.

Looking around the side of the building, he watched Nappa and Raditz as they made their way down the gangplank and began to walk in his direction. They seemed to be engaged in some conversation and didn't notice him. Passing right by where he stood. "You're lucky I'm not an enemy."

They halted stiffly at the sound of his voice, and after a moment of pause, turned to face him somewhat uncertainly. "We didn't expect to see you here, Prince Vegeta," said Nappa after a moment. Something in his tone seemed strangely hesitant, reserved.

"I know."

"Were you waiting for us?" He sounded surprised and a little perplexed now.

"A little," he replied, his smirk slipping at the sense of awkwardness that he felt growing between them. Whole lifetimes of experience separated him from this time and these people. It was no surprise why things felt so strange when he thought about it for a second: he wasn't that same person. "I wondered if you were still with Freeza or if you'd been sent out again."

Quirking one eyebrow, Raditz snorted dubiously and asked, "What? Were you lonely without us?"

Instead of immediately balking at the idea as they had expected, Vegeta seemed to seriously consider the question for a minute. "Maybe. I was bored. I wanted someone to train with."

"You actually going to fight this time?"

"You're welcome to come at me and find out," he responded with a challenging smirk.

* * *

_Well, I'll keep up with my old habit of giving credit to my reviewers. There were more people than I honestly expected to see._

_Thanks to GoldenRat (Yay! A familiar name right off.), Obelisk of Light, Phantom Melody, Zell Dincht7, nickypooh, GuardianSaiyan, koro sama (More familiar names!), kitsuneluvuh, kitsuK8 (No, there's no new Dragonball series coming out. There's just an animated special by Toriyama and a live action movie that doesn't look much like Dragonball at all.), Vegito567, Miako6 (well, I kinda set myself up for someone to yell, but you should go back and read the other chapters too. I spent a lot of time rewriting them all!), and ChibiChibi (Well, we'll get around to that 23rd chapter eventually. You may remember generally what happens, but I not everything's the same.) for your comments. I always appreciate the feedback._

* * *


	7. Chapter Seven

_Okay. You guys are getting this chapter a couple days early because I'm just not going to have time to post anything once we hit December. _

_I've watched the DBZ special at this point, and I have to say that I enjoyed it. When I first heard about it, I was kind of mixed on how I felt about it. I mean, it's been so long, and the plot synopsis I read just…wasn't quite what I would've hoped for. It was really wonderfully nostalgic, and it just took me back to when I was twelve and watching the series. I should mention, however, that this movie isn't for someone who just wants to see another epic battle between good and evil. This one's more about the humor._

_I think this chapter turned out okay, but my judgment might be somewhat impaired due to lack of sleep. It's been hard to get to sleep because my room has been absolutely freezing at night. Residence life had the heat turned on, but they turned it off after they accidentally melted a sprinkler head and set off the fire alarm at almost four in the morning. I shit you not. It was so hot in this building that a sprinkler melted._

_I'm tired, so tired…_

**

* * *

**

Chapter Seven

Looking up at the sky, he squinted as though searching for something amongst the white puffs of cloud. His expression brightened slightly as he saw a dark speck moving through the bright blue expanse, but his face fell in disappointment as the spot morphed into a bird. A frown settled onto his lips as he watched it fly lower, landing in a tall tree some distance away.

Still nothing.

Ever since he'd become a child again, he'd found himself staring at the sky a great deal, hoping to see any familiar figures flying down to greet him. So far, he'd only seen birds and one lone plane passing overhead.

Turning his gaze back towards the ground, he began to walk through the waist-high grass again, noticing absently that it seemed oddly yellowed and dried. There had been plenty of rain recently, and it wasn't late enough in the year yet for them to be dying.

The change had happened so suddenly. One moment he'd been in the middle of a sparring match with Vegeta, and the next instant he'd been a child again, standing alone in a clearing that was unmarked by the signs of Saiya-jin training. After a moment he'd recognized that he was standing in a completely different area of the mountains than where he'd been fighting. There'd been no sign of the other man. Calling his name a few times, he hadn't been too surprised that there was no answer.

Goku hadn't been too concerned until he'd attempted to find the other's ki. It was gone. He couldn't feel even the slightest trace of Vegeta's ki, and all of the other signatures that he'd become used to sensing seemed to have vanished as well. He'd raced back home as quickly as he could.

They'd been gone too, but it wasn't like they'd simply vanished. Everything had changed. His home was back to the way it had been when he was a kid. The house that he lived in with Chi-Chi and Goten wasn't there, and the house that Gohan and Videl lived in didn't seem to have ever existed at all. It was as though time had suddenly spun backwards, and he was once again living alone in the mountains as he'd been before his accidental encounter with Bulma.

What had happened?

He didn't know. It had been weeks since the change—maybe longer. He didn't have a clue why things had changed.

Figuring things out by sitting back and really thinking about them wasn't his strong suite. That was more Vegeta's strength. No, he was better at coming up with ideas in the heat of them moment, before he had the time to really think about them and whether they should be able to work. Some times they did and others they didn't, but everything seemed to work well enough anyway that he didn't see any reason to change. Maybe that was why they made such a good team whenever they fought together.

"It'd be nice to have him around now."

.

In the dark of his room, Vegeta lay in bed, staring up at the ceiling and the circle of pale light that came in through the single window in the far wall. The time of day was mostly irrelevant on the bases. People were coming and going at all hours, so the buildings were always lit and open.

Thoughts whirled around in his head. He was still reeling slightly from the relief of finding out that the Earth really did exist and that everything he remembered had been true. The idea of returning there filled him with a sense of anticipation and even a bit of excitement.

Mixed in with those were many other conflicting emotions. He wondered and worried about what he would find on the planet once he arrived there. What would that world be like? How different would it be from the Earth he knew? Who else might remember? There were so many questions, and there seemed to be no answers.

Rolling onto his side, away from the window, he also wondered what good it would do for him to go to Earth. The man who'd given him the coordinates had said he needed to go there, but he still didn't know if it would do any good. Maybe the best he could do was to simply go there and use the dragonballs to wish the time shift undone. That would be something, but it wouldn't take care of the source of the shift.

"I'm getting ahead of myself," he murmured, rolling onto his other side, staring at the circular window in the wall. "There's no guarantee I'll even make it that far."

He would be risking his life by going through with this plan. There was always the chance that Freeza might catch onto him before he could manage to disappear. He didn't want to die, but he wouldn't let that stop him. It was still preferable to reliving all of this.

Turning onto his stomach, he frowned and huffed into his pillow. While the thought of leaving the diminutive tyrant filled him with something close to ecstasy, leaving Nappa and Raditz behind made him feel as though he was betraying them. A feeling like guilt twisted in his stomach as he rolled that thought over in his mind. Once he was gone, Freeza would inevitably seek them out to see if they might know of his whereabouts, and he would torture them until he became convinced that they knew nothing. He would kill them then.

Rolling over again, he yelped as he accidentally slipped off of the bed and landed on the floor with a dull thud. He lay there for a moment, quietly muttering curses before sitting up with a small groan. At this rate he wasn't going to get any sleep at all tonight.

He sighed, looking over in a corner where he'd thrown his armor. It wasn't fair of him to leave them to deal with the consequences of his actions. "Damn conscience," he whispered as he stood up and walked to the door, not bothering to put his boots on.

Exiting into the hallway, Vegeta walked down a couple of floors to the room that Nappa had told him he'd been assigned to. He could sense the man's ki on the other side of the door, confirming that he'd remembered it correctly. Briefly he paused in front of the electronic lock before quickly tapping a few keys on the panel. It beeped, and a blue light flashed as the door slid open.

The sound of thunderous snores suddenly poured out into hall, telling him that the massive man was asleep. As he walked in, he wondered vaguely whether the sound penetrated the walls of the other rooms around his. It didn't seem likely though. If it did, the people in them were probably plotting his death at this moment.

The door had opened quietly enough, but for some reason it seemed to close with an ungodly amount of noise. In his sleep, Nappa grunted, snores interrupted as he muttered something unintelligible and rolled onto his side, facing the boy. He must have opened his eyes as he was shifting around because he suddenly sat up with a start. "Vegeta!" he exclaimed in a mixture of confusion and alarm.

"Don't be so loud," admonished the child with a note of annoyance in his voice. "Do you want to wake everyone else up?"

What're you doing here?" he asked as he sat up. He sounded groggy and irritated at being awakened in the middle of the night, but, mostly, he sounded concerned. "You haven't snuck into my room since they stopped forcing you to bunk with Raditz."

"It's nothing like that," he snapped, face burning in embarrassment. Thankfully it was hidden in the darkness.

For the first couple of years following the destruction of their birth world, he and Raditz had been assigned to room together because they were both children. He'd been young then, and he hadn't liked that he was being forced to share space with this unfamiliar, older boy. With everything that had changed so suddenly, he'd wanted to hold the one familiar thing that had still remained in his life: Nappa, so in those early years, he would regularly sneak into the large man's room to sleep with him.

Of course, Raditz had made fun of him for it, mocking him and calling him a baby. He'd beat the older boy up for it, but that hadn't stopped the teasing any longer than it had taken his broken jaw to mend. Eventually they had been separated, and Vegeta had started to sleep in his room.

"What is it then?"

"I'm leaving," he said quickly before he had the chance to reconsider and change his mind.

"Are you insane?" hissed Nappa, looking around as though expecting someone to suddenly leap out of the shadows and execute the boy on the spot.

"Possibly," he responded blandly, "but that's hardly the point. I found a way out. I'm taking it."

"Do you realize what you're risking?"

He flinched slightly at the harsh mix of anger and worry in Nappa's voice. "Yes. If I'm caught, I'll definitely be brutally beaten for trying to leave, and it's entirely likely that I'll be killed as well. So what? It's my life. I want the chance to control it for a change."

A long silence passed between them. "Why are you telling me this?"

He didn't answer immediately. "I want you to come with me."

"What?"

"I'm leaving, and Freeza would come to you and Raditz first to find out where I've run off to. He'll kill you if you don't tell him, and I know you wouldn't betray me to him." He paused, fidgeting almost nervously. "I don't want to just abandon the two of you to death."

The look of distaste on his face was difficult to see in the darkness. Even in front of someone like Nappa, he didn't like admitting anything that might even suggest an emotional attachment to another person. It was perceived by many as a sign of weakness, and someone in Vegeta's position couldn't be seen as weak. He had to appear strong always.

"Am I understanding you correctly?" asked Nappa slowly. "You are planning to run away, and you want me to come with you so that I won't be killed at Freeza's hand?"

"That's correct."

"You are, in effect, trying to protect me when it is my duty to protect you?"

"You can't protect me forever. I have to take over some time."

"I know," he responded, recalling with a certain amount of bitterness his earlier conversation with Raditz. "That doesn't mean you should have to yet. You're still only a cub."

The boy bristled slightly at that remark, the fur on his tail puffing out indignantly as he bit back on the urge to snap out that he wasn't a cub. It would've been a pointless argument anyway. Although his mind was still that of his adult self, he was physically still just a child—his voice hadn't even changed yet—and attempting to argue against it would undermine whatever he might have to say. "I can handle it."

"I don't doubt that," said Nappa with a resigned sigh. "You're already acting more mature than Raditz even though he likes to remind me at every opportunity that he's an adult.

He snorted in amusement, smirking at the comment. It wasn't exactly a fair comparison to make between them when he had memories of roughly thirty years worth of life experience over the other Saiya-jin. "Will you come with me?"

Nappa's expression grew serious as he seemed to really consider what the boy was asking. "You do realize that you're only increasing your chances of being caught by asking me to come along, don't you?"

"Yes."

"And you realize how much more your chances will increase again if you invite Raditz too?"

"Yes."

"Are you certain that you want us to come?"

"I am," he answered a bit more forcefully than necessary. Why was he asking all of these questions? Why didn't she just answer the question he'd asked first? "Are you not going to come?"

The large man looked down at him with an unreadable expression. "Of course I'll come. If you're willing to put yourself at risk for my sake, I can't very well refuse your offer," he said still sounding somewhat disbelieving of the whole thing. "I will serve you in any way I can."

His lips twitched into a disapproving frown. "Don't say things like that. I don't want you to be my servant."

"What?"

For a moment he was silent, dark eyes boring into the wall behind Nappa. He couldn't quite look at him directly. "I don't want servants. I would rather have comrades."

The man seemed too astonished to speak for a minute, and when he regained his voice, it had a strange, breathless sound like he'd just finished a heavy workout. "Prince Vegeta, I am truly honored that you would think so highly of me. I couldn't receive a greater compliment from you than that."

A grimace flashed across the boy's face for an instant, passing too quickly to be caught. That feeling like guilt began to squirm in his stomach again. Nappa didn't know, didn't remember, how he would die. He didn't realize that he was praising his killer.

"Saying things like that is really unnecessary," said Vegeta as he turned away and walked back to the door. "I'll talk to Raditz about it in the morning."

"Is something wrong?" The man's voice was concerned again.

The door slid open, and the Saiya-jins blinked from the sudden brightness spilling in from the hallway. "You're not my mother," he scoffed, trying to sound simply annoyed. "Stop acting the part."

Nappa snorted. "You're lucky I'm not. She wouldn't let you get away with half of the crap you pull."

"That's not what I remember about her," he said in an almost nostalgic tone. He seemed to hesitate in the door for a moment, but then he walked into the hall and was gone.

Walking back up to his room with an unusually slow, purposeless pace, he stared thoughtfully at the floor. Even seeing Nappa again, he hadn't thought too much about having killed him in the future. The man didn't remember anything of it. What difference did it make to think about it when he was the only one who remembered?

None.

It didn't make any difference. He still felt guilty over it, as useless as that was.

Entering his room, he frowned at the bed. He doubted that he was going to actually get any sleep tonight. "Might as well make use of this time," he muttered, grabbing his boots and gloves and pulling them on. Just before he left, he decided to wear his armor as well and grabbed it before walking back out the door.

He didn't bother to look up from his training as he heard the sound of the door sliding open and felt another ki signature enter the room. The person's ki was roughly the same level as his, maybe a little bit lower, and seemed faintly familiar. He frowned thoughtfully as he punched the air. Who was it?

Realization dawned on him an instant before the person spoke. "Training alone, Vege~ta?" asked the man, drawing out the middle vowel of his name in a most annoying way.

"Kiwi," he growled, glancing over at the indigo-skinned alien. He was surprised both that he hadn't encountered the alien before and that he was suddenly showing up now, but the only thing that showed on his face was irritation. "That's a stupid question. Now get lost."

"You know, it's dangerous for someone as unpopular as you to be all alone. Someone might think it's a good time to attack you, and you've got no one here to protect you." Even if he'd tried to, he wouldn't have been able to miss the threat and malice dripping from the man's words. He was set on getting a fight.

Looking away from him, Vegeta continued his training. He didn't need to keep his eyes on him to know what would be coming. Why give him that much regard? "As much as they'd like to, those who would try to protect me could do very little against any real threat."

He could almost feel Kiwi's smug smile.

"Don't get too full of yourself. You don't even rank on that list." He allowed one corner of his mouth to tilt upwards.

There was an indignant snort behind him. "You're the one who's full of himself. How long have you been training?"

"Hours." Vegeta didn't miss the edge in the other man's voice.

"You look tired. Did you sleep at all last night?"

"No."

"How unfortunate." He leaned over as Kiwi suddenly shot a ki blast at him, allowing it to sail harmlessly over him and collide with the wall. Straightening back up, he pretended not to notice that anything had happened.

"Why is that?" he asked, punching at the air as though he was striking an opponent.

For a long moment his only answer was stunned silence. "Well, with that lack of sleep, you'll be less alert if someone tries a surprise attack against you."

Another blast shot at him, and he stepped to the side this time, making it look like a part of his exercise. He could sense the alien's astonishment. Stepping to the left as a third attack whizzed past him, he was having difficulty not laughing. It was almost too much. "I don't think one night with no sleep will affect me too greatly. Sometimes I go days without sleep on missions."

"I see…" Kiwi shot a few more attacks at him, and the Saiya-jin continued dodging them, acting as though he didn't notice. With a frustrated growl, the man shot a barrage of blasts that finally forced Vegeta to counter with one of his own.

"Did you really believe I didn't realize what you were doing?" he asked, smirking at the shocked expression on Kiwi's face. "I am no fool like you."

"Don't start acting cocky. I'm still an even match for you in a fight," he growled, clenching his fists and taking a step forward.

"You're an _almost_ even match for me when you're at full power," he said with a derisive sneer twisting his lips, "but how much have you wasted on all of those missed shots? How much have I spent on you?"

He watched as realization struck the man full force, and smug confidence quickly evaporated to reveal sputtering cowardice. "You…you little…" growled Kiwi as he began to shuffle back towards the door, trying to look intimidating even as he was running away. His face burned a dark, angry purple as he shot a final murderous glare at the boy before practically running out of the room.

Letting out a low sigh, Vegeta's shoulders sagged tiredly. It was a good thing that Kiwi was so easy to scare. He'd forgotten to take into account that while he had indeed spent a good deal of energy, the boy had been up all night training, burning much more of his ki over hours of drills and exercise. If he'd taken just a moment to check his scouter, he would've caught the bluff.

The door slid open again, but he recognized these ki signatures at once. Looking over at the entrance, he smirked tiredly as Nappa and Raditz walked in.

"I take it you had something to do with Kiwi running away down the hall," commented the large man with a note of amusement in his voice.

"That was all his decision," he said with a casual shrug.

"You just encouraged him along, right?" Nappa asked with a knowing grin, but his expression grew more serious as he seemed to examine the boy's appearance. "You need sleep."

"I'm fine," he said, drawing himself back up and giving a dismissive wave.

Nappa was unwilling to be deterred. "No, you're not. You need some sleep"

Sleep wasn't what he needed so much as he did rest, but there was no chance he'd get that here. There were too many people who wanted to kill him for that. Maybe he could once they reached Earth.

"Been skipping nap time again?" asked Raditz with a smirk.

"Do I have to break you jaw again? Didn't you have enough of eating through a straw before?" It must have been something about their family. Nobody seemed able to get on his nerves quite as quickly as Kakarotto and his brother.

"Go to bed." Vegeta opened his mouth to tell the large man off, but he paused as he saw the look in his eyes. This wasn't about getting him to sleep.

"You're not going to drop this until I give in, are you?"

"No."

"Fine," he responded, sounding appropriately irritated with the large Saiya-jin. With a huff, he crossed his arms over his chest and began the walk back to the dormitories. Nappa followed behind him, grabbing one of Raditz's shoulder pads and dragging him out as well.

"What're you doing?" he asked, trying to squirm out of the large man's grasp.

"Come on. We've got things to talk about," hissed the bald Saiya-jin, keeping his voice low.

They maintained a tense silence until they were back in Vegeta's assigned room. As soon as the door slid closed and the usual search for listening devices was done, Raditz said, "Nappa told me you're planning on leaving and that you want us to come with you." He sounded a bit dubious about it.

"Yeah. That's right," he said as he pulled off his armor and tossed it away.

"Where're you going to go? Saiya-jins aren't exactly welcome most places."

"I found a planet," he answered vaguely.

"Where is it?"

"It's out in the frontier, away from where Freeza would likely look for us."

The long-haired Saiya-jin frowned in distaste. "I can imagine he wouldn't. What the hell do you want to go out there for? There's only primitive worlds out that way."

"I already told you."

"No, I know you better than that," he said as though he'd caught Vegeta in the middle of doing something he shouldn't. "You wouldn't even think about doing something like this just for the sake of running away. Nappa knows it too, but he's willing to follow you anyway. That won't work with me. I want to know your reasons."

He frowned as he sat down on the edge of his bed. "My reasons are none of your concern."

"Forget it then."

"You can't be serious," grumbled Nappa with an irritated glance at the other man. "You would really rather stay behind and be killed just because he won't tell you why he wants to leave?"

"Sounds about right."

"That's idiotic!"

"You're a real pain in the ass, you know that?" commented the boy, sounding almost amused and surprising the men. "I won't tell you my reasons. They're mine, but I will give you a reason why you should want to come."

"Why is that?" he asked in an antagonistic tone, trying to push Vegeta to the end of his almost notoriously short temper. For what purpose, he didn't know. "Should I come because you're my prince and I'm supposed to follow you like a loyal dog?"

An indignant expression crossed his face at that question, and for a moment he looked as though he might beat the older boy right there. "I have no use for dogs."

"What is it then?" His tone was curious in spite of himself. "Give me your reason if you're so sure it'll change my mind."

"Kakarotto."

Just as he'd expected, Raditz's whole attitude seemed to change almost instantly. He blinked dazedly, staring down at Vegeta as though he couldn't quite believe. Nappa quirked one brow curiously at the switch. "Are you serious?"

"Of course."

"We're going to the planet he was sent to?"

He smirked, noticing Raditz's use of "we." It was over now. "That is the plan. The planet he was sent to is populated by beings that have a physical appearance remarkably similar to our own."

"How similar?" asked Nappa with mild curiosity.

The boy appeared to think over it for a minute. "The biggest difference is that they don't have tails, but they'll overlook them for the most part. As a whole they're a rather dense race," he said, adding the last part as more of an afterthought.

In the future, that same remote planet would be host to some of the most spectacular battles ever fought. The fate of the universe would be decided thanks to that backwater chunk of rock, and almost no one who lived there would ever realize it. They would just continue living out their mundane little lives, content to believe that nothing fantastic ever happened and worship their fake ultimate hero.

Many times he'd wished that the humans would open their eyes to the truth and finally stop worshipping that posturing fool, Satan. That man was insufferable, and his fame was based almost completely on lies—lies that he was, at this point, helping to perpetuate. Although, even he had to admit that they would've been lost in the final fight against Buu if it hadn't been for his interference. He hated admitting that.

At the same time, Vegeta understood that if the humans ever did realize the truth, he would never again have a moment's peace. Unlike most of the other Earth warriors, who lived relatively secluded from the rest of the world, he lived in the middle of the densely populated West Capital. More than, he'd become a member of one of the most prominent families on the planet, and to be a part of such a famous family automatically made him a target for the media. They were already bothersome, nosy pests that he would like nothing more than to punt over the compound's outer wall. He could only imagine how much worse it would become if they ever did figure it out.

"Fine," said Raditz, pulling the boy out from his thoughts. "I'll come with you."

"I expected as much," he said as the long-haired man moved to exit the room. Raditz paused briefly, glancing dubiously back over his shoulder before walking out.

He'd expected Nappa to leave as well, but the man instead remained where he'd been standing since he'd entered the room. His massive form made the room feel rather. Vegeta wondered if the man had actually been serious about him going to sleep. "Who is Kakarotto?"

"He's Raditz's younger brother."

"Are we really going to the planet he's on?"

"Yes. Why would I lie about that?"

The large man gave a shrug of his shoulders. "I'm not suggesting that you are lying, but this boy was sent to the planet years ago. We should have heard something from him by now if he was still alive. You shouldn't have told him until you were sure that Kakarotto isn't dead."

"Kakarotto is alive."

"Are you certain?" asked Nappa, wearing a thoughtful expression.

"I am.

* * *

_Thank yous go out to kitsuneluvuh (You reminded me that I had wanted to put in a scene of Goku on Earth, and no, neither Vegeta nor Goku can become Super Saiya-jin.), kitsuk8 (I still don't think I've quite gotten the awkwardness nailed. I don't think he'd feel much of it if he was just dealing with Raditz. It's Nappa that makes the situation what it is.), XxKuroyoxX, GoldenRat (Funny you should say that I expanded Nappa's character when both of the scenes with him in Chapter Six were shorter than their previous versions. Also, I never said I wasn't planning on keeping them before.), confused (Um…yeah. I'm doing a complete rewrite, so things are going to change.), Eragrand, and Dragonpride (Well, Tabaru/Table is one of the characters in the new Dragonball Z special called—give me a second—Ossu! Kaette Kita Son Goku to Nakama-tachi! He's…well, you should go watch the movie. They're streaming it on the official site until the end of the year, and it's been subtitled in pretty decent English.) for reviewing._

_Also, happy Thanksgiving to all of my readers in America._


	8. Chapter Eight

_Happy slightly belated New Year!_

_Originally I intended to have this up for you guys on New Year's Day, but things happened. The holidays in general threw me off a bit. There was just so much going on with buying presents and visiting family, and being back home with my parents has thrown me off my normal schedule. I'll be moving back into the dorms a week from Monday, so things should get back to some semblance of order soon after._

_For now, enjoy the chapter._

* * *

**Chapter Eight**

Plummeting through the atmosphere, the three round crafts slammed into the planet's surface, sinking into the ground, creating three craters that grew and merged into a single large one. As the Saiya-jins sitting inside of the space pods came out of stasis, Vegeta immediately began to scan the information that had been input into his ship's computer. Even though he didn't intend to carry out the mission, he still wanted to know what to expect if they were forced to fight.

"What are we looking at with this place?" asked Nappa's voice over the radio in his scouter.

He frowned at the information that scrolled in front of his eyes. Since the other two men had been last minute additions to the mission, none of the data had been input in their computers. "We're not the first team to be assigned to this mission."

They weren't the first ones here by a long shot. At least six other teams had been sent here prior to their assignment, and they had all been killed. The last couple of teams had actually consisted of some decently strong warriors, showing that the planet was slowly moving up on Freeza's list of priorities. It still must not have been too serious of a concern if he was only sending them to deal with it. Certainly they were a few steps up from the last group, but they weren't his strongest warriors either.

"So this is an extermination mission." It wasn't a question.

"Yeah. Eliminate all intelligent life forms. No negotiations or concessions will be considered." They would need to be on alert for hostile natives who would likely try to kill them on sight. "Once we're done, we're to radio out so the planet's resources can be stripped."

"As usual, we're the clean-up crew," muttered Raditz in a bored tone. He was more than willing to allow Nappa and Vegeta take the lead on any mission since he was never expected to rise to a position of command. It had been a sore spot for a while that so little was expected of him, but eventually he'd come to see it as a sort of freedom. There were no bothersome responsibilities ever given to him, and no blame was ever put on him—except whatever he would get from Nappa or Vegeta whenever he screwed something up.

"They shouldn't pose much of a threat to us in straight physical force, but, according to the reports, their weaponry should compensate for a lot of the natural difference," said Vegeta as he continued to scan the information. There didn't seem to be anything too difficult to deal with, and he pushed the button to open the space pod door. "In other words, Raditz's ass is fried, but Nappa and I should be able to make it out of here fine."

Grumbling under his breath, he and Nappa also climbed out of their ships. "Why do I put up with this shit?" he muttered irritably.

"Because no one else will put up with yours," responded the boy with a smirk. Nappa's lips twitched in amusement as well.

The trio lifted into the air to survey their surroundings. On three sides their crater was surrounded by thick forest, but the area that they had landed in and the land on that other side was a flat plain covered in dry, yellowed grass and dotted with stunted, scrubby bushes. "What a pleasant looking place," commented Vegeta dryly. "Let's get started."

He thankfully pulled the scouter off of his face, motioning for the other two to do the same thing. They would not be taking the annoying devices with them to Earth. He remembered well enough what had happened when he'd worn one on his first trip to the planet.

"How do we want to do this? Will we fight together or split up?" asked Nappa before removing his as well.

Raditz scowled at the large man, saying, "We'll do it together, of course." The other two Saiya-jins chuckled at that as he roughly yanked the scouter off too.

Extending his ki sense out around them, Vegeta found what felt like a moderately populated city a few miles southeast of their current location. He wanted to avoid disposing of the scouters where people were more likely to come across them.

Lifting the scouter back up to his face, he pointed with his free hand and said, "It looks like the nearest city is in that direction." Turning away, he pulled back and chucked the scouter as hard as he could. The others wordlessly followed his lead.

"Is there really a settlement that way?" asked Nappa, looking thoughtfully in the direction the boy had indicated.

"Of course."

The large man's brows furrowed as he cast a sidelong glance at his prince. "How do you know? You didn't use your scouter to look for it."

"I can sense the energy of living beings," he answered, staring at the spot where the scouters had disappeared from sight. He was being unusually careless about showing off the abilities he'd brought back from the future, but there was no reason to hide it from them. They weren't his enemies. "There's a concentration of individual ki signatures over there, so I know there must be a settlement of some kind."

"Where did you pick up something like that?"

Slowly Vegeta's gaze slid over to regard the bald man. "There was a planet I went to where the warriors were able to sense ki. I thought it would be a useful skill to learn." It was the truth at least.

"Sounds like a load of crap to me," remarked Raditz with a huff.

"I didn't believe them at first either."

Raditz snorted, folding his arms over his chest. "It obviously didn't help them out if you're here now."

One corner of his lips twitched upwards as his eyes took on a more distant look. "True. It didn't save them, but it still gave them an advantage that I didn't have."

"Still sounds like you're making it up."

Shrugging his shoulders and turning away, Vegeta said, "Believe what you want. Go ahead and hope that we're effectively ki blind now that we're without the scouters."

An expression of alarm briefly registered on Raditz's face as he turned to look out in the direction they'd thrown the scouters. There was little chance he'd be able to find one and even less chance that it would still work. He growled, scowling back at the boy.

"It's too late to go back," he said, casting a smirking glance over his shoulder as he began to descend back to the ground with Nappa following behind. He looked like he was almost laughing.

Gritting his teeth to keep from saying something he knew he'd end up regretting, the long-haired Saiya-jin sank back into the crater as well. "What if I tried to go back anyway?" he asked as he landed.

Instantly Vegeta's smirk vanished. He looked at the man with a confusing mix of emotions on his face that momentarily robbed Raditz of all of his anger. "Don't do that," he said, looking almost regretful. "I don't want to have to kill you."

Something about the calm way he spoke was more terrifying than if he'd been screaming threats at the top of his lungs. "Let's just get this done with."

That seemed to satisfy him, but the smirk didn't return. "Get the pods ready to launch. Remove the tracking device, but make sure they're still functional."

"Seems like you're in a pretty big hurry to get this done," commented Raditz as he leaned into his ship to begin work, trying to alleviate some of the lingering discomfort he felt.

"We're still the enemy here. The longer we're on this planet, the more likely it is the inhabitants will find us, and I didn't come here to kill for Freeza."

"We're Saiya-jins. Killing is what we do."

Vegeta scowled disapprovingly at the panel in the side of his ship. Prying the metal piece away to reveal the device sitting in the midst of a bigger mess of wires than he'd remembered, he sighed in irritation. This was going to take longer than he wanted, but he couldn't just rip it out. That, along with their radio silence, would give away exactly what they were up to.

"No," said Nappa from where he knelt working on his ship. "Fighting is what we do. Killing like this was never a part of our nature. That's what we were made to do."

The device had been designed in a needlessly complicated manner, with extraneous wires and mechanisms that made the tracker much more difficult to remove without adding anything to its function. He knew that it had been intentionally done this way. It ran using a separate, self-contained power source in case the ship became inoperable for one reason or another, but Freeza didn't want to make it that easy for anyone trying to desert. "Before Freeza we were thought of as people, not monsters," said the boy in a neutral tone as he carefully cut the first wire.

"What do you know of it? You weren't born until decades after the Saiya-jins had been in service to the Kold Empire."

"I know there wasn't a 'kill on sight' order against all Saiya-jins amongst members of the federation until after we started working for Freeza. Even cubs are included in the order."

The Federation was a union of many planetary leaders who'd banded together in opposition to the Kold Empire and all those who worked for them. Everyone knew they were a mostly symbolic organization. They didn't have the power to combat the Kolds directly, but that didn't stop them from trying to weaken it by taking out some of their more prominent soldiers.

"Is there?"

"Yeah. I ran into some of theirs once." He frowned at a pair of wires held between his thumb and forefinger, trying to follow their path with his eyes. After a moment of consideration, he dropped them, deciding they were to be left alone.

"What happened?"

"I killed them." There was no pride in the statement.

The trio lapsed into silence except for the occasional curses from Raditz as they worked. He was only acknowledged by the other two when he threatened to simply rip the device out.

Tensing as he sensed a group of at least a couple dozen ki signatures approaching their position, Vegeta paused in his work. Their ki levels definitely weren't anything to worry about on their own, but the information about their weapons technology was enough to put him on alert. "Be ready," he warned, tugging his hands out from the mess of wires. "There's a group heading in our direction."

"How do you—"

"I can sense ki."

"Right," muttered Raditz still sounding doubtful.

Standing up, he rose out of the crater again, setting lightly down on the ground just beyond the edge of it. The people were moving directly towards them. There was no confused sort of ambling in their general direction; these people were moving with purpose. It seemed likely that they possessed devices similar in purpose to the scouters.

"There's no getting out of this fight," said Nappa almost resignedly as he landed beside the boy. A moment later, Raditz managed to disentangle himself from the wires in his ship and join them.

"Probably not," agreed Vegeta, brow furrowing.

"So much for your plan to avoid fighting."

"Shut up, Raditz."

They waited for a minute until the first vague shapes began to appear through the trees. OF course they would approach through the forest.

"You really weren't lying about being able to sense them," said Raditz in an incredulous tone.

"That would be a stupid thing to lie about."

The first figure that stepped out from amongst the trees was humanoid in appearance from the waist up, with long, slender limbs that gave it an almost feminine appearance, but the lower portion of its body was some strange mechanical creation. Others followed the first into the open. Each of them were similarly built and had robotic limbs tacked onto where their organic equivalents had once been. Vegeta wondered briefly if this was the result of some cultural practice of self-mutilation or of the previous combat teams that had tried to conquer them.

He winced slightly as he recalled the last time he had encountered such a mixing of mechanical and biological components with the Jinzouningen and Cell. It was highly improbable, but it was still possible that these people could possess that same kind of power. Fortunately, since they did not have that same seamless integration of man and machine, they still had ki signatures that he could track. The points where their robotic limbs and organic bodies connected could also likely be a weak point.

What he could see of their organic bodies looked very soft, almost delicate. They had pale, creamy colored skin stretched over slight frames with little in the way of muscle definition. Their eyes were decorated with some sort of dark makeup meant to bring attention to them and make them look exotic, suggesting a vanity that warrior societies didn't often have the luxury to cultivate.

"They don't look like much," commented Raditz with a shrug.

"Well, neither do I really, but I'm the strongest of us," muttered the boy in a low voice, not removing his eyes from the people as they continued to gather at the edge of the woods. These were the sort of people who'd only become fighters out of necessity rather than because they had any natural aptitude or desire for battle. He felt almost sorry for that, but he wouldn't let it stop him.

One of the native stepped reluctantly out from the crowd, looking distinctly frightened as he took another couple of steps towards the trio. He was a few inches shorter than Raditz, but his build was much closer to that of Vegeta in his current state.

Slowly he lifted a cybernetic arm, pointing what appeared to be a very large gun at them. In heavily accented common he warned them that although they didn't want to, they would not hesitate to kill them if they didn't leave immediately. It was almost humorous in its stupidity.

"This is pathetic," grumbled Raditz. "We could've already killed the lot of them twice over if we wanted to."

Suddenly dozens of weapons rose to point at them. Vegeta shot a glare at the older Saiya-jin that promised pain for him later. "We didn't come here to kill anyone. We're leaving as soon as we finish some repairs to our ships."

"Do you think us idiots, runt?" growled another person walking up to stand beside the first speaker. This one was taller and had a more muscular build. The voice might've almost been mistaken for male, but the owner appeared to be the female of the species. Even tightly bound by strips of cloth wrapped around her chest, her breasts were quite obvious.

Both of her arms up to her shoulders and one of her legs up to the knee had been replaced by powerful-looking robotic limbs. Quickly one of those arms snapped up, backhanding the man beside her. He fell to the ground and quickly scurried back into the crowd, vanishing from sight. She looked after him with obvious distaste.

A vaguely nervous smile spread over Raditz's face. "I guess we know who's in charge around here."

The woman's tawny eyes snapped to glare at him, making him start and his smile falter. "Idiot," murmured Vegeta.

Her gaze turned to the boy, examining him for a minute before moving on to Nappa. The large man returned her stare unflinchingly, but she could see that he was not the leader of the group. She looked back at Vegeta, who matched her glare with ease. "We've dealt with your kind before. We won't be fooled."

"I doubt you know my kind."

"We've met plenty of beings wearing that same style of clothing. You're all the same kind."

"Don't lump us in with those other—" He was abruptly cut off as a beam shot out from the crowd and slammed into his chest with surprising force. He was thrown back over the edge of the crater, tumbling down the steep side until he crashed into one of the space pods.

"Prince Vegeta! Are you injured?" asked Nappa, torn between attending to his charge and punishing his attacker. With no such conflict, Raditz charged into the crowd with his ki blazing.

"I'm fine!" responded Vegeta as he climbed back onto his feet, rubbing the back of his head where he'd struck the pod. He examined where the beam had struck. There was a small crack in his armor, but there was no serious injury otherwise. "Go help that idiot! They may be able to overpower him"

Quickly the large man did as he'd been ordered, diving into the fighting that had begun without him. Flying back out of the crater, Vegeta landed, prepared to fight.

Sensing someone coming at him, he turned and raised an arm just in time to block a powerful metal leg trying to crack his skull. "You're the hag who called me a runt," he growled, and almost feral smile twisting his lips. The woman's mouth pulled back into a snarl as he pushed her leg away.

"Am I wrong?" she asked, throwing a punch at him.

He stepped back from the blow, but suddenly a sword blade extended out from a device built into her wrist, shooting at his face. He barely managed to lean back under it, receiving a shallow cut just above his left eye. She began stabbing at him, growing more furious and forceful with her blows as he dodged them.

"We didn't come here to fight," he said, flipping backwards and catching the woman with a kick as she raced at him.

"Do you honestly expect me to believe you?" she asked, swiping at his midsection and trying to kick him again. She managed to knock his shoulder, throwing him off balance enough that a second kick struck him square in the jaw.

"No, but I was almost hoping you would," he responded as he shot a pair of men who'd been attempting to sneak up behind him. He sneered at her venomous glare. "You've got to do better than that."

The woman growled, charging at him faster than she'd been moving a moment before. He was caught off guard and very nearly took the sword through his stomach. "Your companions are fortunate that most of the women are predisposed at the moment. They only have to face these men," she said, swinging her sword around at him again.

Charging ki into one hand, Vegeta slammed his fist against the flat of the blade, snapping it off just above the point where it stuck out of her wrist. "I don't care. I already said that we aren't here to clear your planet."

The remaining section of sword slid back into her wrist, and a long metal cord shot out in its place. She spun it around for a moment before striking out at him with it like a whip. He frowned as it glanced harmlessly off of his armor, wondering if he was meant to be frightened by that.

"And I already made it clear that I don't believe you," she said, lashing out at him again, jerking the whip in a different direction at the last moment and managing to smack the boy in the side of the head.

The spot where he'd been struck stung angrily, and he felt something wet tickling down his cheek. Reaching up to touch it, he was slightly surprised to find blood on his glove when he drew his hand back. "Well, that a little more interesting, at least."

Flicking the whip at him again, she smirked as it struck his arm, tearing easily through the material of his suit and leaving a bloody trail of torn flesh behind. "It's a taming tool. It appears smooth, but it's covered with tiny hooks that will tear you to shreds bit by bit."

"Taming?" The whip struck the shoulder of his armor, proving them useful for a change.

She managed to wrap the whip around one of his legs as he lifted off the ground, intending to use the increased mobility to his advantage. With a quick maneuver, she managed to throw him into the air and slam him into the ground. "Yes, to control the unruly amongst our men. You are definitely in need of taming."

With a flick of her wrist, the whip was torn away from his leg. Vegeta jumped back onto his feet the moment he was free, shooting off a small volley of ki blasts. "Stronger than you have tried. No one controls me."

He jumped back as the whip suddenly shot out from the cloud of smoke his blasts had created, but it still managed to score a glancing blow across his thigh, cutting over the previous injury to his leg, tearing deeper into his flesh. The woman came rushing out a moment later, hitting him with a kick that was mostly wasted against his armor. The force of the blow, however, threw Vegeta back into a group of men who were trying to flee from Nappa.

The large man seemed satisfied enough with the results as the boy plowed through them, noticing that Vegeta was not injured through it. He quickly charged off in search of new victims.

Climbing out of the pile of groaning bodies, the boy managed to catch the whip as it snaked through the air towards him. He felt it tear through his glove and begin to saw into his hand. "I've had about enough of this crap," he said, tearing the cord out of her wrist with a sudden, harsh jerk. Smirking, he threw it away.

"But we're not finished."

There was a sound like a gun going off, and he suddenly found himself tightly wrapped in a length of the same type of cord he'd just thrown away. He started to struggle against it, but he halted as the tiny hooks began to dig into his tail, sending almost paralyzing pain through his body. Silently he cursed the weakness.

"It has quite a bit of spirit for being so puny," said a gruff but definitely female voice to his side.

"Stop making fun of my height!" he shouted, snapping his head in the direction of the new voice. He was taken slightly aback by her appearance. She was almost completely mechanized. Only her head, left arm, and a portion of her chest remained of her organic body. That explained why he hadn't noticed her approach. With so little of her living body remaining, she had hardly any life energy to speak of.

"Yes, a feisty little squirt," said a new voice behind him. He felt something cold press against the back of his neck. "It's almost a shame we have to break it."

There was a sharp click, and something sharp struck him and sank through the flesh of his neck. For a moment he felt an uncomfortable squirming around the injection sight, but suddenly it erupted into white-hot pain shooting down his spine.

His knees buckled, and he collapsed onto the ground, biting his lip in an effort to keep from screaming. It wasn't long before he tasted blood. The pain slowly began to spread through the rest of his body until it felt as though every nerve was on fire. The world around him seemed to fade out until only the sensation of pain remained. All of his other senses shut down. He couldn't even hear when he finally began to scream.

Slowly the pain began to subside, and his senses started to return. He was lying on his stomach on the ground, and he could hear derisive laughter over him. Beyond that, he could hear the sounds of fighting.

As the world came back into view, he saw that first woman he'd been fighting standing in front of him. She didn't seem to be paying any attention to him, watching her companions fighting instead. He looked too, frowning as he watched Raditz being pummeled by a woman whose body was completely organic. Nappa was doing better against the mostly robotic woman, but he was being hindered as he tried to aid Raditz at the same time.

"You're still conscious," said the woman sounding vaguely surprised. His gaze snapped back to her. "I assumed that you must've passed out when you stopped screaming."

"I've had worse," he commented as casually as he could manage.

She snorted casting him a dubious glance at him. "You can quite playing tough, runt. No one is going to be impressed by it."

With a sudden burst of ki, Vegeta blew the restraining cord off of himself. "I don't play," he smirked, pulling out the object that had been stuck in the back of his neck and standing back up.

"I could almost start to like a male like you," she said, regarding the boy with an expression of something verging on respect.

"Too bad you'll be dead before you can make up your mind," he growled as a blue aura erupted around his body. There would be no more holding back.

"So…you want to give us a warning next time you decide to go psycho like that?" asked Raditz, looking up from his work on the space pod. He was the only one who hadn't finished removing the tracking device yet.

A few feet away, Vegeta sat, reclining against the side of his ship with his arms folded over his chest and his eyes closed as though he was asleep. Every now and then the tip of his tail would twitch slightly as though simply to demonstrate that he was, in fact, still awake.

Looking at him, it didn't seem like he should still be conscious. He was a mess, covered almost tip to tail in blood. His armor was gone, lying cracked and broken on the ground where he'd dropped it, and his clothes were badly torn. The blue material was completely missing from his mid-thigh down on one leg, and half of his shirt had been torn away. He was quick to tell them that his injuries were only superficial, but they knew him well enough to realize that he might be understating his condition.

"Hey, are you listening to me? You could've killed us, you know."

Opening one eye, the boy calmly regarded Raditz for a moment before saying, "Don't cut that yellow wire. You'll lose the power."

The single eye closed again. The other one was swollen almost shut from a well-aimed, if accidentally so, elbow to the face from Raditz.

"Don't tell me you're still sore about your eye. I didn't know you were coming up behind me, and it nearly broke my arm."

"If I was angry, you wouldn't need to question it," he responded in a tone that seemed to indicate he was finished talking, but after a momentary pause, he added, "And you have yet to see me truly psychotic."

"Whatever," grumbled Raditz.

"Just finish your work," said Nappa from where he stood at the edge of the crater. His gaze shifted to the boy. "We have some time. You should clean yourself up a bit while we're waiting."

Vegeta grunted in response.

"At least clean the blood from your tail. You don't want the fur to get matted."

The single eye opened again, and Vegeta looked at his furry appendage with a thoughtful expression. In his memories it had been over a decade and a half since his tail had been cut off, since he'd lost the most distinguishing characteristic of his race and had been locked out of the oozaru transformation. He'd gotten used to being without, but the memory of having it had never gone away completely. There would still be occasional phantom sensations that he'd learned to largely ignore. It was like losing any other limb he supposed.

He had it again—more correctly, he hadn't lost it yet. He was physically whole again, but it would be gone once he figured out how to put time back to normal. "It doesn't matter."

"You won't be saying that once the blood dries and it starts to itch."

In his pod, Raditz began sniggering, shoulders shaking as he tried to suppress his amusement. "Some 'bodyguard' you are. You're more like a nanny than anything else."

Vegeta watched absently as Nappa shot back a retaliatory insult of his own, drawing further into himself and his thoughts. Once he put time back to normal, they would be back in Hell as though nothing had happened. He wasn't saving them. None of this would matter.

Why was he doing this then? Had he just brought them along to assuage feelings of guilt with a wholly useless gesture? Had he just been too caught up in his plans to realize how pointless this was? Was one better than the other?

"Prince Vegeta?" asked Nappa in concern as he noticed the boy's expression. "Is something wrong?"

"I think I sense another group approaching," he answered in what he was certain must be a thoroughly unconvincing tone. He couldn't tell them yet. They certainly wouldn't believe him about the time shift without someone else to confirm that it had actually happened, and maybe he could find some way to salvage their situation. Maybe there was something he could do so that he wasn't leading them back to their demise.

"You do?"

"They're still a good distance away, so it's difficult to sense them clearly." The lie was becoming easier. "Still, Raditz needs to finish the job quickly."

"Why? You handled those others fine last time," remarked Raditz in a tone that was half admiration and half jealousy.

"Yeah, and I burned most of my ki doing it. If another group were to attack, I'd be mostly useless against them." At least he wasn't lying to them completely.

His admission of weakness seemed to surprise both of the men, and Raditz dove back into his work with new energy. Meanwhile, Nappa continued to look over the boy with concern that made his stomach twist. After a minute of sitting under that gaze, he decided that he would clean himself up a bit after all, busying himself to keep from thinking too much. Why couldn't things be easy for a change.?

* * *

_This chapter went through three or four different versions before I decided to stick closer to the original version. It started to seem like I was almost hammering you guys over the heads with some things that I thought were important. I realized that, yes, they are important, but they aren't where the focus needs to be. Amusingly, the first half of this chapter was always almost the same, so I only had to rewrite a portion of that once._

_Anywho, let's get down to the usual business. Thanks to Dragonpride(I live in the US, and I will likely continue to do so for another few years, at least. Depending on how things go, I may try to make a break for the UK.), Johnson(Well, thank you for such nice compliments. I just write something I like and hope others will too.), GoldenRat, XxKuroyoxX(Bulma would actually be about eleven years old at this point, so the story is set something like five years before the beginning of Dragonball), ChibiChibi, FireSenshi2, Obelisk of Light, Shadir, Whatever3691(I promise that they will meet. They didn't have that much interaction in the previous version, so I'm planning on expanding that a bit.), kitsuneluvuh(I'm glad you liked that scene. I originally put it in there because it amused me, and for a while I was thinking of taking it out because it didn't really serve much of a purpose.), kitsuK8(I'm glad you enjoyed the special. I guess it'd be nice to see more specials come out, but what I would love most would be for them to just reanimate the whole series like that. The whole thing would look incredible, and they could do away with some of the really bad bits of filler—get rid of the Garlic Jr. arc completely. I think that would be a better thing to do.), nsomniacartist(You know, I was actually considering having Goku do that. I still haven't completely decided against it yet.), Kiomori, and .Black for reviewing._

_LupinGoddess__: (I needed to separate the comments I have for you because there are a lot) I see your point, and I might've put Vegeta in that age range if the focus of the story was on his life under Freeza's reign. That, however, is not what this is about. I wanted to set the story before the beginning of the Dragonball series because I didn't want to be dropping into the middle of any of those events and because I wanted Goku to still be isolated. I didn't want him to have any of the social connections that he would've established if I'd set the story much later. Eventually I chose to make Vegeta twelve out of amusement because that's how old Goku was when Dragonball started. I also initially chose to have Vegeta at a younger age because I was considering having a sort of mental regression to a more child-like state. His memories would've stayed, but his mentality would've slowly become more childish because, when you get down to it, he does have the brain of a twelve year old boy. It would've happened with Goku too, but it would've been vastly less noticeable with him. There may still be some element of that in this story, but it won't be to the same level I was originally planning because I realized it interfered with the plot too much. Another reason for aging them back so far was because I figured it would be much more disorienting than just going back to being twenty something. Looking at what I've written, I feel that I completely missed adding that in beyond the initial confusion. Also, when it comes to Nappa and Raditz, I feel like they would be better if I wrote Vegeta to be younger. I feel like they would act much more guarded around Vegeta if I wrote him much older because they would be relating to the person who'd been fully poisoned under Freeza's influence. I enjoy writing them as a sort of nakama. I will also (shamelessly) admit that I wanted to be able to hit a few jokes that you'll see in a couple of chapters. Overall, however, I just felt that this story would be better if Vegeta and Goku were children instead of their 20s or thereabouts._


	9. Chapter Nine

_Well, I'm not going to lie. I actually got this sucker finished and typed up by January 20th, but I didn't post it right away because I was sure that I wouldn't be able to get the next chapter ready for a beginning of the month posting._

_This chapter got finished early due to a couple of reasons: it was written mostly during winter break when I had lots of free time, and it's a relatively short chapter. This one is something like 3,000 words shorter than my last chapter, and it's almost 500 words shorter than its previous version. This chapter just seemed to have a lot of superfluous writing in it. It did, and it still does kind of. There's not a whole lot of action in this chapter, but a couple of important things do happen. The guys arrive on Earth, and there's one other important event that I won't spoil for first-time readers. Go read it!_

* * *

**Chapter Nine**

His head jerked up as he sensed it.

It was like a candle had suddenly been lit in the middle of a black room. The light burned bright and proud, pushing back the darkness with its familiar glow. It was ki.

Goku couldn't help the wide grin that broke over his face. He would recognize that ki signature. It was Vegeta.

A sense of relief washed over him before he realized that he'd ever been worried about the other Saiya-jin, but he had. How could he not? If time really had gone backwards, Vegeta would've been back in space with Freeza and countless other guys he was no longer stronger than. Some of those guys he'd even killed, and the other weren't likely to forget his future rebellion—they were even less likely to forgive it.

Not that Vegeta would appreciate being worried after. He could easily imagine the glare he'd receive for that, but Goku frowned as he realized he was imagining him still as an adult.

Cocking his head slightly to the side, he tried to imagine what Vegeta would look like as a kid. He would be shorter, for sure, and he'd be less muscular-looking too, probably. He would have his tail again too, but that didn't really mean much for how he would look. Would anything else be different? It was a hard thing to imagine. He just didn't seem like someone who'd ever actually been a kid.

Slowly he became aware of two smaller ki signatures alongside Vegeta's and he frowned in confusion. Who could they be? After a moment, he considered who they might be, but he couldn't understand why they would be with him. He'd killed one of them, and it didn't make any sense why the other would be with him. "Guess I'll just have to wait and find out what's going on."

…

Climbing out of the space pod, Vegeta stared at the sight before him with an unreadable expression firmly set on his face. Overhead white, puffy clouds floated lazily across the bright blue before drifting away. He could hear birds—which he usually found incredibly irritating—twittering and chirping from their perches hidden in the branches of some nearby trees. The buzzing of small insects hummed in his ears as well, and the scent of wildflowers mixed with the distant smell of a human city tingled in his nose.

Off in the distance he could see the familiar metal towers jutting up into the sky, indicating the location of the city he'd smelled. He had always thought that the so-called skyscrapers were rather aesthetically vulgar, but, for once, he could think of almost nothing that could match the horrid buildings of metal and glass in beauty. Almost.

"So this is the place?" asked Raditz, walking up next to Vegeta, who was careful to maintain a neutral expression. It was obvious by the tone of his voice that he wasn't impressed by what he saw.

"Pathetic little mud ball, isn't it?" remarked Vegeta in a surprisingly fond tone as he stretched his arms up into the air, joints popping and cracking loudly. After sitting so long in the space pod with his healing injuries, his entire body felt stiff and a bit sore. His movements felt just a bit sluggish, but that would wear off after a bit of use.

Glancing down at the boy with a perplexed expression, Raditz wondered why he was using such a tone while using demeaning terms to describe the planet. "I guess…" he said as though suspecting that this was some sort of trick.

Vegeta continued to stretch.

"It doesn't look like Kakarotto's done very well on his mission though," he continued uncertainly. "That city doesn't look like it's been touched."

Behind them, Nappa cast a glance at the prince, who either didn't notice or chose to ignore it. This planet was far too peaceful to be housing a Saiya-jin child sent to purge it of all intelligent life. The boy must have died. He wondered if Vegeta had known or if he'd relieved believed that he was alive.

"No, he completely failed at it."

He had known then.

"This planet would be worthless for our purposes if he'd actually managed to complete his mission. His expression grew serious as he crossed his arms over his chest, brow furrowing slightly as he continued to stare at the city. "He forgot that. Hopefully he hasn't forgotten everything else."

Nappa frowned, wondering if he'd missed something and feeling quite certain that he must have. "He really is alive then?"

An annoyed scowl turned on him. "I already told you that."

"You did, but the way you were talking…it sounded like he must be dead. You said that he failed at his mission." It was never a proud moment, admitting doubt of one's leader.

The expected harsh reprimand never came. Instead, Vegeta snorted and shrugged his shoulders, seeming faintly amused. "You misunderstand me. Failure does not equate to death in this instance. He simply forgot his mission."

"How do you know what happened to him?" asked Raditz, seeming bothered by the boy's knowledge.

"I can't tell you yet," he responded, lifting up into the sky. "Maybe I'll explain everything after we find Kakarotto. It all depends on how things turn out there."

Slowly he began drifting towards that city, looking expectantly at the men. He knew they would follow him, and after another moment of waiting, they did. When they reached him, he shot off towards the city, gesturing for them to come with him.

Arriving within the city, Vegeta dropped quickly to the ground, landing behind a building so that they wouldn't attract too much attention. Humans were rather dense and oblivious to most things that were out of the ordinary, but they weren't completely blind. Even they would notice if a trio of people in strange clothing flew in and landed in the middle of their city, and that would inevitably lead to panic. They didn't want that. It was very difficult to calm humans back down once they got started. They were such an excitable race.

"Why're we sneaking around?" asked Raditz as he and Nappa landed in the alley as well. "This isn't the way we do things."

Vegeta snorted derisively. "Doing things _that_ way won't get anything accomplished. We're not here to conquer the planet. Besides, most of these humans wouldn't be able to handle the idea of what we are, and it would send them into hysteria."

"What? The fact that we're Saiya-jins?"

"Don't be a moron. They have no idea of the reputation we have. The very idea that we're aliens will be enough to do it for them."

"How do you know so much about this place? You knew what they looked like before we came here, and you knew that Kakarotto hadn't carried out his mission. You seem to know a hell of a lot about this place even though you've supposedly never been here before!" shouted Raditz, finally growing fed up with feeling like he was being strung along. There was something very wrong in all of this, something that just didn't make sense, and it bothered him.

Vegeta wasn't surprised by the outburst, but he hadn't known exactly when to expect it. He supposed that it made sense for it to come now. Up until now there had still remained some semblance of what passed for normal in their lives, but there was none of that left on Earth. Of course now was when it would all break.

For a long moment he was silent, a contemplative look on his face. "I will explain everything to you two regardless, but I need to find something before I can do that."

As he started to turn away to leave the alley, Raditz suddenly grabbed him by the remains of his shirt and lifted him off of his feet. The aggressiveness surprised Vegeta. "Stop jerking me around! Tell me now!"

"What are you really angry over? Is it how much I seem to know about this planet or how much I seem to know about your brother?" asked the boy in a calm but amused tone of voice. There was no trace of anger in his voice or his face as he allowed Raditz to continue holding him off the ground. "Do you think I'm just using him to manipulate you?"

His grip on Vegeta's clothes slowly loosened, and the boy dropped easily extricated himself from his grasp. "What's the truth? How long have you known about him?"

"I haven't known very long at all, actually. It was before my previous mission when I was behaving so strangely, but I still wasn't certain if it was real or I was just going crazy."

"How did you find out about him?"

"I don't know," he responded, brow furrowing thoughtfully.

There was some truth in that too. He didn't know why he knew, how he still remembered everything from the future. Was there a reason for it? Could it just be some fluke that had left his memories intact, or could it have been done intentionally? That last one seemed somewhat unlikely. Something about this situation just didn't seem quite right for someone seeking revenge or to punish him. It didn't seem personal enough.

"You can't really expect me to believe that you just suddenly woke up knowing that my brother was alive and living on this planet," said Raditz dubiously. There had to be a better explanation, a real explanation.

"Perhaps," said Nappa before Vegeta had the chance to think up a convincing lie, "it has to do with the unique inherited trait of the royal line."

Two pairs of dark eyes looked up at him without understanding, and he knew that further explanation would be necessary. But he'd expected that much before he'd opened his mouth. He sighed, massive shoulders heaving resignedly.

"All members of the royal lineage are born with certain innate psychic abilities, but their strength is typically very minimal until the adolescent stage is reached. At that point, these abilities begin to develop rapidly," he explained, slipping into the instructor tone he hadn't used since the prince had grown beyond his ability to teach.

Vaguely Vegeta could recall Nappa telling him this once before, but he'd been over a full cycle older then. He remembered it had not been a pleasant experience.

He'd begun having nightmares in which he witnessed the destruction of his home world and watched his people dying as though he was on the planet with them. It wasn't unusual for him to have nightmares, but these had felt so much more real. He could feel himself dying with every dream. For weeks he'd tried to ignore them and act as though everything was normal, but that had only resulted in a great deal of lost sleep.

It had all come out one night while he'd been on a mission with Nappa. The nightmares had been growing increasingly graphic, and he woke up screaming at the latest one.

The large man—always a light sleeper—had awoken groggy and disoriented at the sound of the usually unshakable Saiya-jin Prince's terrified screams. Once he'd made certain that they weren't under attack, he'd begun questioning Vegeta about the reason for his screaming. It had taken a great deal of coaxing on Nappa's part, but eventually the teen had given in, too drained from weeks of minimal sleep and stress to put up his usual strong resistance. He'd explained about his dreams, certain that the man was going to think him insane.

It'd surprised him when Nappa had instead suggested the dreams might be connected to developing psychic abilities. He had explained about the special traits of the royal bloodline, and then he'd started to hypothesize that his dreams might really be the residual memories of the Saiya-jin people in their final moments of life. The memories had been unconsciously transferred to him by the telepathic bond he'd unknowingly shared with all of his people. Because of the strength of the collective memory, it had lasted until his abilities had begun to develop. He would need to learn a special type of meditation in order to control it.

His father had decided to keep the knowledge of the royal line's abilities a secret from Freeza at any cost, so he hadn't told the young Vegeta who'd been a bit of a show-off. Instead, he'd told everything to Nappa in the event he wasn't able to tell the boy himself. He couldn't have made a wiser decision on the matter.

"Psychic abilities?" asked Raditz, bringing Vegeta back out of his memories.

"Yes," responded Nappa, watching Vegeta as the distant, clouded look in his eyes began to clear away. "Most Saiya-jins possess some degree of psychic ability. It's what allows them to communicate with one another telepathically."

"Fine, but what's so special about the royals?"

"Their abilities are stronger. A telepathic bond exists between them and all other Saiya-jins. It's what allows them to lead. They're also capable of establishing links with those who are not of Saiya-jin blood," he explained, a contemplative expression slowly forming on his face. "It is a bit early, but it is possible those abilities may be beginning to show themselves now."

Raditz glanced back at Vegeta, wearing an appraising, studying look on his face, and the boy found himself reliving a sensation that he'd experienced a great deal when he'd first begun staying at Capsule Corp.

Even though she'd been utterly terrified of him when they'd encountered each other on Namek, Bulma Briefs had quickly overcome her fear after they had all returned to her home planet. Once that initial fear had gone an academic curiosity about Saiya-jins in general and him in particular had sprung up in its place. She'd hounded him with questions about his people and his planet, and she'd begged to run all sorts of tests on him. He was the first real extraterrestrial she'd had the opportunity to really interact with, and she had wanted to learn everything she could about him. Of course, he'd refused her at every turn, but that had done little to deter her.

She'd frequently looked at him the same way. He'd hated it them, and he hated it more now. "Stop staring at me like that before I black both those eyes."

He grudgingly looked away. "Do you know where Kakarotto is?"

"I know he's somewhere on this planet but not exactly where. His ki is too weak for me to sense it easily." A small smirk tugged at his lips as he realized what he'd just said.

"Why aren't you searching for him then?"

"Don't be an idiot. I've been searching for him since coming out of stasis. I can still search for him with my ki sense while doing other things," said Vegeta before walking out of the alley. The two men followed after him, although, Raditz seemed mildly more reluctant to do so.

"Where are you going?" asked Nappa, frowning curiously as they stepped out onto the sidewalk. The city opened up around them, filled with people who, admittedly, did look very similar to Saiya-jins.

"I don't know," he answered, turning sharply to his right and taking off down the street. "I just don't want to stand around in that alley while I'm searching for Kakarotto's ki. Moving makes me feel like I'm making progress."

Curious and confused stares followed the trio as they walked down the street, making Nappa and Raditz feel increasingly uncomfortable. Vegeta, however, didn't seem greatly bothered by any of it, moving with a more casual stride that made him seem almost at ease. It was very different from the usual measured, stiff gait he walked with. This difference was not lost on Nappa, who watched the boy with great but restrained interest.

"I thought you said they'd overlook us," hissed Raditz, shooting a murderous glare as a pair of shameless gawkers who stood across the street. They looked properly embarrassed and quickly scurried away.

"No, I said they would overlook our tails. Clothing like our—your armor and the simple state of my attire—will always attract this sort of attention." Vegeta frowned, looking down at the tattered remains of his uniform with distaste. He was almost half-naked, and what remained of the blue material was heavily stained with blood that belonged to both him and others. There was no way he was going to meet the younger Saiya-jin in such a pathetic-looking state. "We need to get new clothes."

…

Eyes narrowed as their owner stared at the glowing screen, and a frown settled on dark painted lips. "Just as I suspected," he murmured quietly.

"What is it, Lord Freeza?" asked the familiar drawling voice from over his shoulder. A moment later Zarbon's pale green face appeared there, illuminated by the screen's light. He looked, but he could not understand what his master found so displeasing.

"Those Saiya-jins are trying to leave me."

"Sir?"

Pointing at a trio of green dots near the center of the screen, the tyrant said, "This is the planet they were assigned to. Notice that it looks as though the ships are still there. However, Vegeta's somewhat unusual behavior and specific request for his fellow Saiya-jins to accompany him on this mission made me suspicious, so I had a special tracer placed inside Raditz's ship. The other two would have been certain to notice it."

"Where are they?"

Moving over to a point near the edge of the screen, Freeza tapped a small, red dot, wearing a very self-satisfied smirk. "Here. They went very far out into the frontier. They probably hoped that it would keep me from being able to find them. Maybe it would have worked if Vegeta hadn't been too impatient and waited a little longer."

A smirk slowly stretched across Zarbon's face. "Sir, allow me to dispose of them for you. They are not worth dirtying your hands over."

Suddenly he felt his feet swept out from beneath him, and he fell hard onto the tiled floor. When he looked up, he saw Freeza standing over him no longer smiling, and he knew that he had overstepped himself. "Don't be so obvious. I never said anything about killing them."

"Forgive me, Master Freeza," he apologized quickly as he rose back onto his feet. "What will you do to them? You do not intend to simply let them go without punishment, do you?"

"I never said there would be no punishment, but a quick death at your hands would be far too much of a kindness for them—especially Vegeta since he doubtless is the leader in all of this. He would not have dared to attempt something as foolhardy as this if he didn't believe death a better alternative to being under my command," he said, smile returning as he sat back in his hover chair. The boy would wish to be allowed to die, but there would be no sweet escape granted to him. No, he would live, and he would regret.

"The way you speak makes it sound as though you suspected that Vegeta would eventually do something like this. Forgive my impertinence, but why would you not take steps to prevent it from happening?" asked Zarbon, half-expecting to receive another strike for his question.

"No matter how grown up he likes to act, Vegeta is still nothing more than a child, and children are expected to make mistakes in testing their boundaries. I allow him the opportunity to make mistakes so that he may learn from them, but that doesn't mean there are no consequences for his actions," as he spoke, his smile seemed to grow broader and more sinister. A light chuckle escaped between his lips as he floated out of the map room. "Normally it is left to a child's parents to teach him about those consequences, but, alas, Vegeta has neither mother nor father to teach him anything. Thus, the duty falls to me, and it is a duty that I do not take lightly."

* * *

_Thank you kitsuK8 (I think the progression may feel a little stalled here, but I made it a short chapter to keep it from dragging too badly. Also, I'm glad you like my characterizations.), InspiredDelinquent, Luke (I just write for the fun of it, and I'm glad that you and others out there enjoy it. Don't worry. I will finish this story. After that…well, we'll see what comes of it.), GoldenRat (Vegeta with a plan is also much more fun to write than crazy, psychotic Vegeta because I get to make him a snarky little bastard. I didn't get to put much of that in this chapter, but oh well.), Green. on. Black (Sorry. I have type your name with the spaces or it won't show up when I post the chapter.), kitsuneluvuh, divad relffehs (That might be an amusing thing to try, but Vegeta's so focused on other things right now that I doubt he'd think of it or be willing to teach them right now.), ChibiChibi (He's probably just a little extra sensitive about his height because of how short he feels up next to Nappa and Raditz right now. I considered taking it out because I wasn't sure it was really in character, but, in the end, I decided that it was humorous and should stay.), VeggieBlueRaven (I really try to do a good job with their characterizations, and I'm glad you like the ages. It wasn't just some arbitrary decision on my part. As for who else might remember…I'm afraid that would be telling. You'll just have to read on to find out.), Obelisk of Light (I actually tend to create original foes rather than just reusing canonical enemies. It generally works out well since I'm not trying to introduce some new, super powerful bad guy. Now, obviously I do intend to use Freeza. I'd be an idiot to overlook a great villain when he's right there, but he's not the only problem they'll have to face.), Syron13 (I'm glad you like it. They'll be meeting up with Goku very soon, and then the fun should really get started. Oh, and I'm glad you like all of my quotes. Don't think I didn't see them on your profile page.) for your reviews. You guys are awesome!_


	10. Chapter Ten

_Well, here's the chapter it feels like everyone was waiting for. Yep, Goku and Vegeta finally reunited. Enjoy it._

_I wasn't sure I'd get this one done in time. Although I had it written up in plenty of time, I got a bit distracted from typing it up by a friend getting ready to leave for a semester in Germany. We've been helping her get ready and trying to spend extra time with her before she leaves. I miss her already. Last night was our final going away party for her. We went to the melting pot, which—for those who don't know—is a fondue restaurant. It's really good but really expensive. I split my meal with two other girls, and I still ended up paying almost thirty dollars. It was so good but so painful to look at the bill afterwards._

* * *

**Chapter Ten**

It felt strange as he flew over the planet, staring down at the ground even as he followed the small ki signature that he'd finally managed to pick up on. The world below looked both familiar and foreign, sometimes alternating between the two within the same moment. When they passed over a city, he spotted a couple of buildings that made him think he knew where he was, but the absence of other visual landmarks and the likely presence of ones that had no longer existed by the time he'd come to Earth would quickly disorient him. The areas outside of the cities were, if anything, even more visually unfamiliar. He was quite glad the he didn't require the visual cues to navigate.

"Are you sure that ki sense of yours is right?" asked Raditz, tugging lightly on the collar of his new red t-shirt and keeping his tail wrapped tightly around the dark gray pants he'd picked out as well. He wasn't accustomed to such loose clothing, and although it wasn't uncomfortable, it felt very strange. Flying slightly in front of him, Nappa seemed quite uncomfortable in a dark green muscle shirt and brown pants.

"You should know better by now than to doubt my ability. I know he's out here. Saiya-jin ki feels different from these people's," responded the boy with a hint of annoyance in his voice. Vegeta had traded in the remains of his tattered uniform for an oversized dark blue shirt and a black pair of what the sales clerk had called "bike shorts" that reached down to just above his knees. That the store hadn't had any in their sizes was the only reason the two men weren't wearing the same pant style. He was quietly thankful for that.

"People?" asked Nappa curiously. He never called those of other races "people," usually opting for less humanizing terms. Where had this sudden regard come from?

Glancing over his shoulder at the man, Vegeta frowned, seeming not to comprehend that what he'd said was at all strange. After a moment, he pushed the concern aside and looked back in front of himself.

They were approaching some mountains now that looked more solidly familiar than any of the man-made places they'd passed over. It wasn't surprising really. Mountains weren't going to change as much as a city of thirty something years without some more than ordinary outside influence, and they'd tended to try keeping the damage they caused to a minimum.

He'd initially been rather annoyed by how much that restricted him, but he'd eventually come to see it as a challenge of its own. It was a challenge of his control over his strength and himself.

Without realizing it, he'd begun to fly faster as they drew nearer to the familiar—if incredibly weaker—ki signature, beginning to outpace the other two. Raditz especially started to lag behind, but he refused to bring any attention to it. That would only invite mockery and scorn from the boy. It really wasn't fair that he was so much weaker than the little runt.

"Prince Vegeta," called Nappa, slowing down slightly so that he was at the same pace as Raditz. "There's no need to be in such a rush. It's not like he's going anywhere."

Looking back at them, he seemed mildly surprised by the distance that had grown between them and slowed down to allow them to catch back up. "I forgot you might not be able to keep up," he said in the closest he could manage to an apology for them.

To Raditz it sounded more like an insult, and he felt a mounting sense of bitterness towards the boy. He knew that he shouldn't feel this way, had no right to feel this way. Vegeta came from a bloodline that had all but guaranteed him superior battle power, and he had been born of blood that should have sentenced him to the lowest of the power classes. He'd already risen above that. He should be satisfied with that, but he couldn't help how unfair it felt that this kid had been born with a higher power level than he was ever supposed to achieve in his lifetime. "I don't need any favors," he grumbled to Nappa.

The large man gave a dismissive snort, staring straight ahead as he said, "It's a bit late for pride now when you're here under the prince's favor."

Face burning in anger and shame, the younger man looked as though he wanted to slam a fist into Nappa's face, but he refrained. He knew how useless it would be. Quietly he cursed his weakness, and by association, their strength.

They were beginning to pass over the mountains now, nearing the ki signature, and Vegeta had to actively restrain himself from shooting off towards it at top speed. He was surprised by his own eagerness, but he understood it too. He wanted a genuine confirmation that the things he remembered weren't fake. Even after hearing it from that man on Planet 63, he couldn't completely shake that last lingering sense of doubt until he met someone else who remembered. He needed someone else to tell him that it had all happened.

Coming to a large clearing in the woods, he stopped, looking down at the solitary figure standing in the grass and staring back up at him. It was a small boy with dark, wild hair and a furry, brown tail.

"Kakarotto…" said Raditz, recognizing the boy immediately. He looked just like a miniature version of his father, their father.

Lips twitching into a smirk, Vegeta suddenly dove towards the ground. He faintly heard some exclamation from the men, but he paid them no attention. He watched the boy's face, looking for some sign of recognition. Dark eyes widened momentarily in surprise before narrowing slightly and gaining the sharp clarity reserved for battle, and his lips tilted upwards in an anticipatory smile.

There it was!

Fists collided, Vegeta pulling back on his momentum and much of his ki at the last moment to reduce the force of his punch to something that wouldn't immediately shatter the other Saiya-jin's hand. "Kakarotto."

"Vegeta."

Pulling their fists apart, the pair quickly re-engaged. They traded some light punches and kicks, and Vegeta managed to reject the temptation to flaunt his now greatly superior strength. As vindictively satisfying as it would've been in the short term, it would be no good if he ended up seriously injuring Goku. Instead he kept his ki pushed down to close the gap between them, allowing them to fight on a more even level.

"What the hell? What is this?" asked Raditz in a mixture of confusion, anger, and alarm as he and Nappa continued to hover in the air. He wasn't certain which was the dominant feeling, but the combination made him want to kick the little prince's teeth in. "Why is he attacking my brother?"

"Calm down," said the older man, brows deeply furrowed in a thoughtful expression. "It's not a real fight; you can tell that Prince Vegeta is holding himself back. It's a greeting."

"Greeting?" Among their people a common way of greeting comrades or siblings or even mates that one hadn't seen in a while was to engage them in a brief sparring match. It was how their people reconnected and strengthened the bonds they'd formed with one another. However, this was not a sort of act performed between strangers, and although Kakarotto would not be expected to know this custom, Vegeta was quite aware of it. They were being much too familiar for supposedly never having met before.

"I know. They shouldn't." Either the prince had abandoned propriety altogether or something else was going on.

Slowly the pair descended to the ground, landing a few meters away from the boys. They watched the fighting, noticing how familiar the cubs seemed with each other's styles, but what struck them most was how unfamiliar Vegeta's seemed to them. It was an especially jarring realization for Nappa.

There were certainly some familiar elements about the way he was fighting, but the traditional Saiya-jin style of fighting that the prince had originally been instructed in had become polluted almost beyond recognition. He also seemed to completely his tail waving freely behind him instead of keeping it wrapped securely around his waist. It was almost as though he'd forgotten its presence, but Kakarotto too had his tail out without consideration. Maybe it was a gesture of fairness, but that didn't seem very likely. Freeza had worked very hard to beat any idea of fighting fair out of the boy, demonstrating some of his preferred dishonorable methods on him to make certain he understood them.

For another couple of minutes the fighting continued, drawing to a close as Vegeta and Goku broke apart and straightened up out of their fighting stances. The younger boy was panting slightly and seemed to have taken a couple of decent hits, but nothing looked serious.

"You're taller than me," commented Goku, sounding almost surprised.

"It only makes sense. I am older than you."

A broad grin broke over his face. "Yeah, but I'm used to you being the shorter one. It threw me off."

Immediately Vegeta's expression turned murderous, and he was struck by a very powerful urge to put all of his power into one punch to that infuriatingly smiling face. He knew that he was always going to be a bit on the short side, but that didn't mean he liked to be reminded of it. Being around Nappa and Raditz, who towered over him, only made him more conscious of his height—or lack thereof as the case was. "That's no excuse. I'm no more used to you being shorter than me."

"But you're not much taller," he continued, seeming oblivious to the other boy's growing ire. "How old are you?"

He glared at Goku for a long moment, looking for very much like he wanted to throttle the younger Saiya-jin, but finally he seemed to abandon that thought, sighing resignedly. "I'm the human equivalent of about twelve."

"Really? I would've guessed you were closer to nine." His smile seemed to grow wider. "You really are short."

"Shut up! I am not short!" Damn it! Why was it that everyone seemed to be picking on that lately? "I am a perfectly average height for a Saiya-jin of my current age."

"So…you're just short on human terms?"

It had to be a family talent of theirs to irritate him, it just had to. Was it their goal to send him into a murderous rage—forgetting that Goku had certainly achieved doing that already. "I'm not human. Their standards don't apply to me. It's just the way our kind age."

Saiya-jins maintained a rather childish appearance into their later teen years where they would go through one rapid growth phase into their adult states. It was a wholly unpleasant experience that condensed the years of hormonal imbalance and general awkwardness that humans endured into a period of roughly six months.

"You know, your voice sounds funny," he commented with a laugh.

"At least I don't sound like a girl," retorted Vegeta, lips quirking back up into that familiar smirk.

He laughed at that too, knowing that he'd set himself up for that and unbothered by it. "You look different too. I never saw you with hair over your forehead before."

"Try not to sound like a complete idiot. I wasn't born with a hairline like that," muttered Vegeta, frowning and tugging lightly on his bangs. Although he wouldn't admit it, he would have preferred it if that hairline had been one trait that hadn't carried through to him. Still, he couldn't quite imagine himself looking like that as an adult.

Expression growing more serious, Goku said, "I wondered for a while if you were even still alive. I couldn't find your ki, and then I figured out that since time had gone backwards you were probably back with Freeza."

His expression twisted into a sneer for a moment, turning quickly into a more neutral expression. "You thought I was dead. Well, there was a while where I wondered if you even existed."

"Why would you wonder something like that?"

"No one else seemed to remember anything, so I started to doubt that any of those future events had actually occurred. There was no evidence in favor of any of it being real and plenty against it."

"Didn't you want it to be real?"

"Moron. Of course I did."

"Then why didn't you just believe it was?"

Vegeta scowled, remembering just how frustrating it was arguing with the other Saiya-jin and his particular brand of logic. "Do you even wonder why exactly I'm alive right now? It's because nobody who's currently strong enough to kill me remembers anything that happens in the future. Apparently very few people are even aware that there was a time shift. Everything around me said that it never happened, and it's hard to argue otherwise when you have nothing but some memories that no one else shares."

The boy cocked his head slightly to one side, seeming to actually consider what had been said. "But you still came."

"I had to."

"To see if it was real?"

Shaking his head, Vegeta responded, "No. I received other confirmation that my memories were real, and I would have passed up coming here if there was some other place I would've needed to go to time back right. I was told that this was the place I needed to go."

"Do you know why?"

"Not really. It seems like something intentionally caused the time shift, but I don't know the specifics. Either way, there are some things that need to be explained to those two," he said, motioning towards Nappa and Raditz, who were watching them didn't seem to have heard any of their conversation.

"They don't remember either?"

"You're the only other person I've encountered so far who does."

"Oh. Well, that explains why they were willing to come with you; they don't remember how they died."

"Killed," corrected Vegeta in a carefully quiet voice. The greater part of him was glad that they didn't remember anything. It meant they didn't remember how much of a monster he became later on, but a small part of him wondered how they would've reacted to him if they had. "Let's not try to sugar coat it. We are each responsible for the death of one of them."

Goku frowned as he glanced briefly at the pair. He'd almost forgotten the hand he'd played in his own brother's demise. "How'd you convince them to come all the way out here? Didn't they ask questions?"

He smirked again, but it seemed a bit forced this time. "There were some questions, but they were mostly from your brother. He was the more reluctant one. Nappa wants to believe in me, so he hasn't asked a lot of questions even though I can see he wants to." A shadow seemed to pass over his face as he turned and began to walk over to the others.

"What made Raditz decide to come?" asked the younger boy, following just behind.

"I told him you were here."

"Really?" He didn't seem to quite believe it.

The smirk on his lips seemed to become a little more genuine. "You're thinking of them as the same people you met in the future. Don't do that. They're not them."

As they reached the two men, Vegeta found himself once again being snatched up by the collar of his shirt and lifted up to eye level by a rather irate-looking Raditz. Behind him, Nappa sighed and shook his head with the air of a man who'd this all before and knew how poorly it was going to turn out. "You're not putting it off any more! I may be willing to accept that you knew about my brother being alive and living on this planet, but this is too damn much. What's going on? Why are you and Kakarotto acting like you've known each other for years?"

Unsurprisingly, the boy was unimpressed with his attempt at bullying. They all knew it was a useless gesture, varying for Vegeta from amusing to irksome. Right now he was more inclined towards the latter. "Put me down."

"Tell me what's going on?"

"Or what?" he asked, grasping Raditz's wrist tightly with one hand. "I said that I would explain everything, didn't I? Now, you can either release me on your own, or I can crush your wrist and release myself."

"Don't do that, Vegeta. That's not very nice," said Goku suddenly.

For a moment the two men seemed stunned that a boy so much weaker and of such a low station would have the audacity to speak to the prince in such a familiar, chastising tone. Vegeta, for his part, just looked slightly annoyed. "Way to kill my fun, Kakarotto."

Quickly he readjusted his grip on Raditz's arm, squeezing it so that he hit a nerve and forced the grip on his shirt to weaken until he could easily slip out. Releasing the arm, he sank lightly back to the ground. He shot Goku an irritated glance, folding his arms over his chest in his most familiar stance.

"Did I miss something? Did my little brother just talk you down from breaking my arm?"

"Feel free to thank him later. There are more important things that need to be discussed," said Vegeta with an impatient huff. He was ready to get this explanation over with now. "You're about to get those answers you wanted so badly."

He began explaining to them about how time had shifted backwards, adding in more details for their benefits since they didn't have the advantage of unaltered memories like Goku did. He told them that he and Goku had met each other in the future, skipping over any explanation of his reasons for that meeting and any of the events surrounding it. They still had their memories, so, although they had technically never met before, they still knew each other. The younger Saiya-jin corroborated his claims when they began to make sounds of disbelief at the whole situation.

It was an insane story to be sure, but with the two of them confirming each other's stories, the men seemed to eventually accept what they were saying. As impossible as it seemed, there was something in it that rang true. They knew each other too well for it to all be a lie. That Vegeta's recent behavior had been somewhat off character didn't hurt their case any either.

"So you're not really kids?" asked Raditz, sounding somewhat confounded.

"Only physically," said Vegeta, but he seemed to reconsider that statement as he glanced at Goku. "Well, at least I'm still an adult mentally. I can't say Kakarotto ever was one to begin with."

"Hey!" interjected the other boy, wearing a frown that really looked more like a pout. Vegeta smirked in amusement but said nothing.

It was then that Nappa chose to ask about that topic that the prince had quickly skirted around during his explanation: what had brought them to meet each other? Immediately the smirk on the boy's lips vanished, and he refused to say anything on the matter, leaving it to Goku alone. He skipped over both Raditz and Nappa's deaths and tried to put his fellow Saiya-jin's loss in the least humiliating light possible. He made sure to leave out the part where he'd asked Kuririn to spare Vegeta's life. That didn't stop Raditz from bursting into laughter at it.

"You lost to my little brother and his friends?" howled Raditz, feeling almost as good as if he'd been the one to beat him.

"I could've killed them."

"You were trying to show off then?" asked Nappa, surprising Goku with the almost parental tone he was using. This really was very different from the way he remembered the man. "You wasted your energy playing around, so when you really needed it, you had had nothing left."

"Not exactly…" he muttered, face burning in mounting anger and embarrassment.

If anything, Raditz's laughter seemed to grow louder and more excited, oblivious to the dark glare aimed at him. He was really pushing it. "You got shown up by a third class and a pack of no-count humans!"

"We just got lucky. He was stronger—"

A hand suddenly slammed down on his shoulder, nearly causing his knees to buckle as his brother interrupted. "Don't be so humble. You should be proud at having been able to defeat him."

Sensing Vegeta's energy slowly swelling, Goku frowned at the man's behavior. He was about to get himself seriously hurt. "I didn't beat him though."

"What?" Raditz frowned in confusion, and the mounting ki seemed to drop back down slightly.

"He beat me. I'm pretty sure he broke most every bone in my body. He just didn't get the chance to kill me."

"Didn't get the chance? What happened to him?"

"I got hit by the damn genki dama," he grumbled, shifting uncomfortably at the memory. That had probably been the single most painful non-lethal attack he'd suffered in a fight. Being on the receiving end of even a severely diminished one had allowed him to understand how devastating an attack it had the potential to be.

"The what?"

"Long story. Very painful," he said shortly. It was obvious that he was becoming tired of this topic. The tip of his tail twitched and he stood with his arms crossed tightly over his chest. "None of that's important now anyway. We need to change time back to the way it was."

"Why's that such a big deal?"

"Because we're altering the timeline, bringing about who knows what kind of variant future."

Goku's brows furrowed for a minute. "Wouldn't that just make a different timeline, like, what happened with Trunks?" Nappa and Raditz were confused again.

"I don't know. This sort of time travel seems like it might operate differently from the type that he used. We may be creating a divergent timeline, or we could very well be changing out own future. Either way, I can't see where this would make for a good future," he mused, brow furrowed in thought as he stared at nothing in particular.

"Why do you say that?" asked Goku innocently.

Looking at the other boy with an expression that indicated this was a situation needing to be taken with great seriousness. "Our fight won't happen if I'm already here in any timeline."

Making a sound of disbelief, Raditz asked, "You actually want to go through with a fight you already know you're going to lose?"

Of course, he still disliked thinking about that loss. He hated remembering the sting of humiliation as he'd been forced into retreat and the dual rage and shame he'd felt as his life had been spared at the last moment. That a human he could have swatted like a fly under normal circumstances had managed to pose an actual threat to his life—with a sword of all things—had burned him deeply. Even so, the hate he'd felt for it and his former enemies had faded, eventually. "It was an important fight. That fight pushed us to Namek, pushed us to confronting Freeza."

"You fought Freeza?"

He snorted disdainfully. "He's been dead for a decade and a half in our time."

Quietly Goku smiled at Vegeta's evasion of the question. He'd certainly fought against Freeza, but he'd also ended his part in that fight by dying in a most humiliating way. The greater embarrassment for him was probably that he'd openly cried and begged for a man he'd sworn vengeance against to defeat the tyrant. It wouldn't have been so bad if he hadn't been resurrected shortly afterwards and had to face those people who'd been witness to his shameful display.

"That sound like a good enough reason to change time back," said Raditz with sudden enthusiasm. Nappa maintained a thoughtful silence behind him. "How do we go about doing that exactly?"

"Could we use the dragonballs for this?" asked Vegeta suddenly, ignoring the man's question and the extremely bewildered looks now on his and Nappa's faces. They didn't know what these dragonball things were, but they sounded rather vulgar.

Giving it a bit of thought, Goku frowned and scratched his head. "I guess they might be able to fix things, but I don't know if something like this is within Shenlong's power. We don't have a dragon radar to find them anyway, and the only person who could make one for us is…"

"Bulma…" finished Vegeta. He sighed heavily as one hand rose to cover his face.

It had all very quickly become too confusing for either of the men to follow the conversation, but they still wanted to understand. "Who is Bulma?"

For a long moment no one said anything. The rather sheepish expression on Goku's face seemed to say that he didn't think it was his place to tell them, leaving it up to the prince's discretion whether they found the answer or not. Slowly he pulled his hand away from his face, wearing a suddenly tired look. "She is my wife."

Now his desire to come to this planet and restore time made more sense. It wasn't about having killed Freeza so much as it was about coming back to and regaining his woman. He wanted his life back.

A frown creased Nappa's face. "That is not a Saiya-jin name."

"I know. She's human."

Chuckling darkly, as though he'd just heard the punch line to a really great, twisted joke, Raditz asked, "Whatever happened to 'I will never mate with anyone outside my species'?"

"Shut up."

"Seriously, what happened?" persisted Raditz. "Were you just that desperate for a lay?"

Ki suddenly shooting up, Vegeta launched himself at the long-haired man with an angry growl. There was a loud crunching noise as boot made contact with nose and Raditz was thrown several meters away by the force of the blow. Blood gushed out of his nose, and he quickly reached up with one hand to slow the flow.

Vegeta leapt into the air and came down hard on the man's stomach, sending the air rushing out of his lungs. Extending one hand towards Raditz's face, the boy began to charge a ki blast. "Say that again," he taunted in a low, dangerous tone. Raditz gulped nervously, having difficulty swallowing around a sudden lump in his throat and held his silence. "Idiot. Say anything like that again and I will kill you. Do you understand me?"

Nodding his head slowly, he managed to stutter out, "Y-yes…"

"Good," said the boy, reabsorbing the ki into himself and stepping none too delicately off of Raditz's stomach. He looked at the other two as though daring them to say something else on the matter.

"We should go see if Bulma has the radar at this point, or maybe, if she remembers to, she can make one for us even if she doesn't have one already. I'll go get the four-star ball, and then we can get going," said Goku, wearing a small smile despite the threat that had been made against his brother. He was glad to have something to do now.

"No," said Vegeta sharply.

"What?"

"There will be no _us_ involved in this. Give me the dragonball. I'll go on my own." He wanted to see his wife alone. No one was going to come with him for this.

* * *

_Here you go guys. Hope you enjoyed this chapter. It should get a bit more action-y in the next one._

_Thank you to FireSenshi2, kitsuneluvuh, Green. on. Black (Well, I'm sure you can guess at least some of Freeza's plans, but you'll have to wait to see it.), kitsuK8 (Yes, chapters like the previous one can still be useful, and it was actually quite important because of what happened at the end.), VeggieBlueRaven (I'm not going to abandon it. Right now I'm rewriting the old version I had posted before the two year break I took from the fandom, but this version of the story has only existed for about six months now. I said that I would try to keep to a monthly posting schedule, and I've managed to do pretty well with that so far. The plan, for now, is to just continue on with that.), Obelisk of Light (Eh, I've always imagined that Freeza was quite fond of Vegeta. To me, it's like he finds Vegeta interesting and entertaining because of his rebellious, independent nature. He isn't like all of those other spineless sycophants, so he breaks up the monotony a bit. Now, I'm also firmly settled in the camp that thinks he abused and raped Vegeta, but I look at it more like war rape. It is used as a demonstration of dominance and control over the victim, so I don't necessarily see Freeza as being gay either.), GoldenRat (They've got some time. Freeza still has to travel to Earth, and we don't know exactly how far away he is. Of course, they don't yet know he's heading towards them.), Vetygas Rath (Of course I remember you! I was so happy to see your name again, and I'm glad that you're still interested in reading this after so long.), Luke, and leneypoo for your support of my story. _


	11. Chapter Eleven

_Here's the next chapter. Despite being sure I wasn't going to get this finished in time, I actually did have it ready for a posting on the first. Too bad the computer network decided to go down. Apparently something actually broke on the network. That happened on Tuesday, and on Friday we finally have internet again…sort of. The connection is still unstable, going on and off frequently. On the up-side, one of my professors gave my class an extension on our papers that were due Wednesday. That's kind of nice._

_On that note, I have a number of other papers that will be due next month…well, more like the end of this month really. You guys probably shouldn't expect a new chapter in May because of this. I just probably won't have the time with four papers and final exams coming up. Expect to see the next chapter in June._

_I don't really have much else to say right now…so I guess I'll just shut up and let you guys get to reading. Enjoy._

* * *

**Chapter Eleven**

Flying from the mountains where Goku lived to West City had taken him much longer than he had anticipated, forgetting that he wouldn't be able to make the trip as quickly as he was used to. The sun had already begun to sink below the horizon by the time he'd finally set down atop the roof of one of those tall buildings the humans loved so much.

He almost hadn't recognized it. Like the one they'd passed over earlier, this city looked very different from what it would become, but it was even worse this time because of how much more familiar he was with the city's future form. It hadn't been until he'd spotted the familiar yellow dome that he'd been sure he was in the right place. There was no chance of mistaking it for any other place when it had the Capsule Corp. name and logo emblazoned across the side of the building. Not a one of the Briefs family had even been known for their subtlety. He supposed he should be thankful for that in this instance.

He could see a figure moving leisurely around the front lawn gardens, and he realized that it was most likely Mrs. Briefs tending to her precious flowers. Even with all of the money that woman had access to, she still insisted caring for the gardens herself instead of hiring someone to do the job for her. Maybe she did it just to give her something to do with her day.

The ditzy woman had always been horribly annoying and forward, attempting to flirt with him and commenting on how handsome he was. Even years after he'd settled down with her daughter, she continued that behavior, and he wondered now if she was really serious or just did it for fun. He hoped for the latter but still generally tried to avoid her as much as possible. She made him uncomfortable.

From the beginning the woman had seemed to have an inexplicable need to, as she'd put it, "make him feel like a part of the family" despite everyone else trying to tell her what a villain he was and his own claims to want nothing of the sort from them. He'd alternated between ignoring all of her friendly and overly familiar advances and returning them with venomous remarks that would've reduced any normal person to tears. She hadn't even seemed to hear him when he'd done the latter, and wondered if it was on purpose. Could anyone actually be that oblivious?

He'd balked when she'd begun to insist that he should call her "Mom." Even after he'd more or less become a member of the family, he'd continued to adamantly refuse that. She wasn't his mother, and the idea that he would accept her as even the poorest of replacements was absurd. Of course, that hadn't seemed to affect her in the least either. It rather vexed him to realize that he almost missed that.

"Bothersome woman," he grumbled from his perch near the edge of the building. A gust of wind, cooler than he might've expected, rushed past him, and he crouched closer against the roof where warmth from the day's sun was slowly radiating back up into the atmosphere. He'd never been fond of the cold, and he was ill-attired for this cooler weather.

Continuing to watch for another minute, he decided that he would wait to go down there until the woman had gone inside. It wasn't that he worried about potentially frightening her. No, she was almost unflappable to a nearly disturbing degree. Even if he were to drop out of the sky and land right in front of her, she would probably just smile and accept it all with only the barest questioning.

She would likely say something about how adorable—here Vegeta shuddered for reasons that had nothing to do with being cold—he looked and usher him inside for something to eat or drink, and she would begin chattering away about some inane topic he didn't care anything about. She was utterly unbelievable, but it was just the way she was.

What seemed even more unbelievable at times was that a woman like Bulma could come from people like the Dr. and Mrs. Briefs. One could see where she'd gotten her intelligence and even her looks from, but nowhere in that pairing could he find where she'd inherited such a fierce vanity or so fiery a temper. Neither of her parents had ever demonstrated such traits. He didn't particularly mind that; there was only room in that household for one person like her.

That woman had a brilliant mind—despite the many times he'd said otherwise in their arguments—and sharp wit, but she could also be a horribly aggravating person. She loved to play games with him. Her favorite was to make him blush, which was far easier to do than anyone might've expected.

All it took was a comment or two on his appearance. It was just something he couldn't take. He knew that she found him physically attractive, but even after more than a decade, actually hearing her voice appreciation for his body always left him face flushed and suddenly shy. She loved being witness to this different side of his nature and being the one to bring it out, and in those private moments between just the two of them, he didn't mind it so much either.

What he did mind was when she decided to play her little game in public. It wasn't the words she used that bothered him so much—she never said anything particularly explicit—as it was that she did it for the specific purpose of making him blush. It undermined every unapproachable aspect he tried to maintain.

She knew that. It was probably a part of why she did it and why she enjoyed it so much. It showed that her dark, intimidating prince wasn't quite as fearful a creature as he liked to appear.

Of course, it didn't mean that he couldn't be. More than one idiot had ended up in the hospital after assuming that he'd been completely defanged by taking up a family life. No, he still had his fangs. The only difference was that he used them with a little more discretion now.

Along with her little game, she took an almost perverse delight in teasing him about how at odds that sort of behavior seemed up against his almost complete lack of shame when it came to nudity. It didn't matter how many times he'd tried to argue that those two things were hardly the same. Just because he couldn't take her appreciation of his body didn't mean that he was a prude.

When it came to things like casual nudity, she was much closer to being the prude. Even after over a decade of living and sleeping together, she would still become flushed and flustered any time she happened upon him as he was dressing or coming out of the shower, but he'd noticed that as scandalized as she liked to behave, she never looked away from him. And on those rare mornings he would allow himself to sleep in, he would always see her cheeks turning pink as she watched him get out of bed, wearing nothing but an occasional amused smirk.

It was just one of the differences in the societies they came from. Her society taught that the naked body was a sexual item and something to be ashamed of. The society that he'd been born into made a great distinction between sexual nudity and casual nudity, and the one that he'd grown up in had too little privacy for a person to be able to afford a sense of shame or modesty.

Realizing that he'd been caught up in his thoughts for quite some time and the sun had already dipped completely below the horizon, Vegeta mentally smacked himself. He couldn't believe he'd allowed himself to become so incredibly distracted. It was official: living on this planet was turning him into a sentimental fool.

He could already hear Raditz laughing again. "Perhaps I should break his jaw to go along with his nose…or maybe a rib. Let him try to have a good laugh with a cracked rib or two."

Quickly glancing over the lawn, he checked to see if Bulma's mother was still outside. He didn't see her, so he assumed she'd taken to the house for the evening.

Just as he was about to fly down to the Capsule Corp. compound, he sensed an unfamiliar ki signature overhead. It vanished abruptly, and when he looked for the owner, there was no one in the sky. He scowled as he began looking around for something out of the ordinary, taking a few steps away from the edge of the building in his search. There was nothing.

Suddenly he sensed it again, and an instant later he felt something slam painfully down into his back. The force of the blow sent him crashing through the roof and all of the floors below until he finally slammed to a halt on the ground floor. It looked like a lobby of some sort. People in the wide open room stared at him in shock, and he heard one or two shouting to call for an ambulance.

"Ah…damn it," he groaned as he slowly pushed himself into a sitting position. The people only seemed even more stunned at this. He was cut and bleeding, but his injuries seemed impossibly minor for what he'd just done. "Ow. I landed on the dragonball."

Unable to help themselves, one or two people smirked or chuckled at what they must have thought was an unusual euphemism.

He reached for the small, brown sack tied at his waist, wanting make certain that he hadn't damaged it. The sound of metal groaning and glass cracking overhead, however, caused him to pause. Looking up at the ceiling, he hissed, "Shit…"

…

"Vegeta!" exclaimed Goku as he sensed the other boy's ki level spike sharply for a moment in distress.

The other two Saiya-jins turned their attention on him. Raditz paused in the midst of cleaning a large fish that Goku had caught a short while ago, up to his elbows in the creature's innards. Nappa looked up from the fire he'd been attending.

"What happened?" asked the large man stiffly, trying to appear as calm as he could.

Shaking his head and frowning, Goku responded, "I'm not exactly sure what it was, but I think Vegeta must have been attacked by someone. His ki spiked and then fell just a bit."

"You can do that ki sensing thing too? Is it really that useful?" asked Raditz, seeming to miss the more important point.

"Is Prince Vegeta in danger?"

Again he shook his head, brow furrowed and lips pursed in thought. "He doesn't seem to be hurt too badly, so there's no need to start worrying about him just yet. Even at his current level, Vegeta can take a lot more than that before he's in any real trouble. I think he was just caught a bit off guard."

"He always could take a beating," commented Raditz wryly. He frowned sheepishly and seemed to shrink away slightly from the reproachful glare the older man shot him.

"You're saying that we should wait and see what happens?"

"Well, he is the strongest of us. What could you do if whoever attacked him turned out to be even stronger?" asked the boy, unknowingly hitting on one of Nappa's personal sore spots. "Though I don't think I could just sit back if it seemed like he was in serious trouble either."

"You're that loyal to a guy who tried to kill you?" asked Raditz almost incredulously.

"He's my friend."

Both men seemed thoroughly taken aback by that statement. "Does _he_say that you are friends too?" asked Nappa, wondering if this was a one-sided sentiment or something more genuine.

"As close as he'll come to outright admitting it," said Goku with a shrug and a fond sort of smile. "That's the thing about Vegeta, or at least, the one I know. He can't say a lot of things like other people, so you have to learn how to listen for what gets left out and changed."

For a long moment the large man sat in silent consideration. "Alright," he said finally. "We'll wait for now, but you'd better keep track of that fight. I want to know if it starts to turn bad for him."

"Right."

…

Releasing a burst of ki that threw away the layer of rubble burying him, Vegeta climbed out from the remains of what had once been yet another towering skyscraper. He looked up at the sky, but it was useless. There was no trace of the ki signature, and the cloud of dust thrown up by the building's collapse was too thick for him to see anything more than a couple feet away. It was frustrating.

Whatever had hit him had possessed a decent level of power, but it was nothing that he should've had difficulty fighting if he'd been facing his attacker in direct combat. This game of ki hide-and-seek made things much more difficult. It wasn't enough to sense it the instant before the attack was made, and sensing it at the moment of attack was even more useless.

"This could be a bit of a challenge," he muttered, wiping away a trickle of blood that was threatening to run into his right eye. Somewhere in the back of his mind, he was vaguely annoyed that his new clothes were already torn up. He hadn't even had them for a full day yet.

In the distance he could hear the sirens of approaching police, rescue, and medical vehicles, and he knew they were coming to the building he'd unintentionally brought crashing to the ground. Somewhere closer by he heard the sound of someone talking about the building collapse as though holding a one-sided conversation, and he realized that it must a local news reporter. They were always fast to the scene. Too bad they were completely useless otherwise.

Frowning, he reached out with his ki sense. There were far fewer people than would have been present during the middle of the day, but there were still a good number of people buried within the building's ruins. Most of them wouldn't survive even if they were found right away, but there were some humans who would or might survive if the rescuers could find them quickly enough.

He looked in the direction he could hear the sirens coming from despite being unable to see the flashing lights. They wouldn't be able to do it. As hard as they would try, the rescuers would be searching blindly, and they were incredibly limited in how fast they could reach people. He wasn't so limited, and he could feel where to look.

Glancing skyward again, Vegeta growled out a curse and began digging through the debris. There was nothing else he could do until he felt that power again, and it was because of him that these people were in this unfortunate circumstance. He supposed that he owed it to them to at least attempt to save as many as he could. Damn his conscience. Damn Kakarotto. Life had been so much simpler when he didn't care about anyone else.

He lifted a chunk of concrete nearly four times his size, hefting it with seeming impossible ease. There was only more rock and metal and glass beneath it. He sighed and used his ki to vaporize the rock slab before beginning to sift through the wreckage again. This was going to get tiresome very quickly.

"What are you doing here?" asked a decidedly male voice behind him.

"Digging. What does it look like?"

Suddenly he sensed that unfamiliar signature from behind, and he spun around with his arms raised in a defensive posture. He was surprised and somewhat irritated when he again didn't see anyone, and the power had vanished too. This was really beginning to make him angry.

"No," hissed that voice, suddenly in his left ear. It was so close he could feel the breath on his skin. An involuntary shiver ran down his spine.

Before he could turn back around, he felt a hand close tightly around his tail, and his strength immediately drained away. "What are you doing on this planet? You shouldn't be here yet."

He felt the ki again, stronger than any other time before. It still wouldn't have been anything worth worrying about under normal circumstances, but with his tail in the hand of an unknown enemy, he was unable to do much to defend himself. He was beginning to remember why he'd gone to the trouble of ridding himself of that weakness in the future.

A large ki blast suddenly engulfed his body, burning, searing his skin. The grip on his tail only seemed to grow tighter, forcing him to endure it bare. He resolved to show as little pain as possible, clenching his jaw and squeezing his eyes shut as though trying to block it all out. It didn't make it feel any better, but he didn't make a sound of pain.

When the attack finally finished, he began to slump forward, but a hand wrapping around his neck pulled him back into an upright position. The fingers felt rough and scratchy against his skin, like sandpaper. He was pulled back and lifted up so that his feet no longer touched the ground. He'd lost all leverage now. "The rumors about your people are true then, I see," commented the voice in a tone of almost academic curiosity.

He grabbed the hand around his neck as it began to tighten, trying to pull it away. Even knowing that his efforts were futile, he had to try to get free. "Your kind really is made almost completely defenseless when your tail is grabbed. Why would a race that is so proud of being strong keep such an easily exploitable weakness?" A third hand grabbed his left arm and twisted it painfully behind his back.

"Just how many arms do you have?" he grunted in question, still trying to pry the hand from his neck. Yet another hand grasped his other arm put it into a similarly painful position. He kicked and struggled, but his efforts had little effect.

In a very precise and controlled motion, the man twisted Vegeta's left arm until his shoulder gave and popped out of its socket with a sickening snap. The boy's struggling ceased for a moment as the sharp pain registered in his brain. An involuntary gasp escaped his mouth, but he quickly bit down on his bottom lip to silence any other vocalizations he might make. He felt the grip on his arm release, and the limb fell limply at his side.

"Perhaps saying 'almost' is giving you a bit too much credit. It seems I should simply say that you are completely defenseless." Again he began to struggle, kicking and squirming with renewed vigor.

The grip on his neck tightened further, severely limiting his ability to breathe. He right arm was let go, and it quickly rose back up, claming at the fingers squeezing his throat. Just as his vision was beginning to go spotty, the grip on his tail was released, and he was roughly tossed away.

Almost immediately an aura burst to life around his body, and he righted himself, turning and shooting a blast of his own at his enemy. He scowled as he saw a figure dodge to the side. It had four arms, but he couldn't make out any other specific details. "Well, that's a distinctive enough trait," he murmured, wrapping his tail around his wait, hiding it beneath his overlarge shirt.

The figure suddenly seemed to disappear, and most frustratingly, the ki signature vanished along with it. He began cursing again, but he paused as he again took note of the sounds of the sirens getting closer. For a moment he'd allowed himself to forget exactly where they were. The sounds of the ki blasts must have sounded like massive bombs going off. The people were probably going into a panic.

They would never accept the truth of what had really happened here, and he was in no mood to try to explain it all to them anyway. He needed to get away from the destroyed building.

Just as he'd begun to fly off, the power returned overhead, and ki beams started raining down on him. He darted through the air, trying to dodge them, but a couple managed to clip him before one shot through the meat of his thigh. Reflexively he clutched his leg as the wound began to ooze blood, but he continued flying until the beams ceased.

Shooting up into the sky, Vegeta stretched all of his senses in an effort to find his attacker before he took another hit. It was humiliating. He'd taken so much damage and had managed to only get off one attack of his own—an attack that hadn't even hit.

Head jerking to the right as he sensed the stranger again, the boy shot a quick barrage of ki blasts towards it. The signature vanished for a moment, but then he saw a couple of his blasts collide with a figure. With a snarl he sped towards it, and as they met, it engaged him in a brief exchange of blows that Vegeta was currently ill-suited for. He managed to block most of the attacks even with only one useable arm, but he was left with little opportunity to take the offensive.

One kick caught him in the jaw, and a hand again caught him around the throat. It began to squeeze, threatening to completely crush his air passage. "You shouldn't know about this planet. You shouldn't remember anything!"

For another few moments the man held him like that before suddenly throwing him into the ground. Vegeta struck with enough force to create a small crater where he landed. As he tried to push himself back up, another ki attack was sent down on top of him. Behind that was another, and a third followed that one.

Slowly the man sank down to hover just a few feet above the Saiya-jin child's prone form. "Why do you remember?"

"You…you're the one responsible…for the time shift," croaked Vegeta, finding it difficult to talk. He tried to sit up, but suddenly the man dropped down, landing on top of him. He felt a couple of ribs crack, and every breath suddenly became a fiery, stabbing ordeal.

You shouldn't be aware that there even was a time shift. Why are you exempt from the rules? Why?" This time he stomped down on the boy's stomach, making him gag and heave. He did it a few more times until Vegeta finally began coughing up blood. "Why?"

Snapping his right hand up and firing a ki blast at the man, Vegeta forced himself to stand in spite of the pain. He knew that he was in poor shape and had almost no chance of winning, but he couldn't just give up. He'd done that once before. That hadn't ended up well for him. "Don't…know."

Recovering from the attack, the man seemed nonplussed but not overly surprised that his questions had received no real answer. "You don't know either? Well, aren't you just completely worthless?" He paused, seeming to smirk for a moment. "I suppose you've heard that line plenty though, monkey prince."

He knew he was being baited. He knew he shouldn't rise to it. He knew it would only end poorly for him, but he couldn't help it. With an angry growl, he lunged at the man. It was only at the last moment that he noticed the small flash of ki and pulled back just in time to avoid being gutted by a small ki blade extending just a couple of inches from the tip of one of the man's fingers.

The wound it was still wide and rather deep. Blood began to pour out, and Vegeta sank to his knees, clutching his stomach with his good arm as though trying to hold himself closed. The man grabbed him, lifting by the collar of his shirt and lifting him up. One of his other hands reached out, touching his stomach, pulling back almost covered in a layer of the red fluid. He seemed to grasp at something, but the boy couldn't tell what it was. "My, you certainly are full of it, or at least, you were."

There was what felt like a flash around them, and suddenly the air was cleared of dust, the sounds of the sirens were gone, and the building was once again standing as thought nothing had ever happened to it. Vegeta was quick to understand that it was because nothing had happened to it. Time had been shifted backwards, but he was still injured and bleeding. He'd traveled through time without being altered. "W-why…"

With a chuckle and a shrug he let go of the shirt collar, dropping Vegeta back onto the ground. "Collapsed buildings make people start to think something big is going on. One dead runt doesn't attract near as much attention."

"I won't—"

"Fool. You only managed to avoid a faster death. Even though your innards aren't lying out in front of you, you still won't likely survive, but…if you hurry, you might still be able to see some of your human family before you expire." With a laugh, he lifted off into the air and vanished again. Vegeta got the distinct impression that he didn't intend to reappear this time.

Lifting his gaze and looking around, Vegeta saw what the man had been talking about. He was lying in the Capsule Corp. front lawn. The bastard had meant to kill him in front of his own home.

A pained smirk twisted his lips. He'd meant to kill him, but he hadn't actually achieved it. That was a very stupid thing on his part. Leaving a Saiya-jin with even the slimmest chance of survival was a serious mistake. Most of them were just too damn stubborn to die if given the option, and the guy couldn't have left him in a better place to get help. "Idiot."

Slowly, painfully, he pushed himself to his feet and stumbled across the lawn, leaving a dark trail of blood in the grass. His vision was beginning to blur, and his head started to swim. Stumbling, he collapsed onto his knees again, and this time his legs refused to obey as he tried to force them to stand again.

He refused to give up. He wasn't about to let himself die like this after he'd gone through so much just to get here. Dying right now just wasn't an option, so swallowing his pride for the moment, he began crawling and eventually dragging himself towards the building that would one day be his home. Slowly darkness began to cloud the edges of his vision, and the world became blurrier.

Reaching the front door of the familiar building, he paused for a moment to rest before once again trying to make himself stand. He succeeded this time by leaning most of his weight against the outside wall. Extending a bloodied hand, he pressed the doorbell, almost laughing as he heard the chime ringing inside. Dr. Briefs had set it up to be heard anywhere within the main house or personal laboratories so that people wouldn't be missed simply because no one was near the front door at the moment. It had woken him up enough times in the future that he could attest to its functionality.

Slumping against the wall as he waited for someone to answer, he slid slowly back to the ground with a low groan. What a pathetic sight he must be. He was starting to feel very tired and cold now, colder than he should be. He knew what was coming.

Hearing footsteps approaching the door, he attempted to pull himself one more time, but his legs gave out almost immediately. "Don't die," he commanded of his body just before everything went dark and he collapsed completely. In the last moments prior to consciousness slipping entirely away from him, he heard the door opened followed by shocked yelling. All was gone after that.

* * *

_Yes, I am evil. I know._

_Thanks to kitsuneluvuh (I'm glad I could make you feel better. It is the power of fandom at work.), GoldenRat (I don't know. They never really seem to ask for advice. In general they just seem to do things and hope it all works out alright in the end.), leneypoo (Heh...Yeah, Bulma's going to get pulled into the height joke. Originally it was meant only as a one-shot joke, but it just kept popping back up.), Whatev3691 (Actually, I believe that I neither confirmed nor denied whether Bulma remembers or not. Giving out answers like that would take away all of my fun.), Obelisk of Light (Well, I don't suppose it would be especially hard to convince her if she does remember, but if she doesn't…yeah. She could be one tough cookie to get on their side.), Conor (Oh, my grammar's certainly not perfect. I just try to do the best I can. Thank you though.), KitsuK8 (They split up, but they'll get back together. I really liked them having that sort of meeting as opposed to something else. It just felt so much more Saiya-jin to me.), sapphire-hummingbird, Miako6, j. (Well, there was no V/B reunion…yet. This just needed to happen to keep the plot from stalling out on everyone.), XxKuroyoxX (Well, you, like everyone else, will just have to wait another chapter to find out how that works out.), and Night'sBullet for reviewing. Seeing your feedback is always a really great encouragement._


	12. Chapter Twelve

_Um… So how's everybody doing?_

_Ahem. Well, I know that I said I'd be uploading the next chapter in June. Obviously that didn't happen as we're now a couple days into July. Sorry about that, but anyone who read the author's note at the beginning of King's Legacy should know why I'm a month late. I'm not in the mood to explain myself all over again._

_Anywho, here's the new chapter. Yes, Bulma finally makes an appearance in this one. Hopefully, I'll be able to get back on schedule and have the next chapter up for August. Things are just generally a bit crazy in my life right now, so you guys will likely have to bear with a bit more occasional awkwardness until things get a bit more settled._

* * *

**Chapter Twelve**

Eyes cracked open, looking up.

Vision was blurry. A bright light hung overhead. Figures all attired in the same color surrounded him. Their faces were largely hidden beneath masks that covered from the nose to the chin.

Skin was cold. His clothes had been removed. There were too many injuries to be concerned about modesty. The scent of his own blood hung heavy in the air, mixing unpleasantly with smells of antiseptic and bleach.

In the background he heard a periodic, high-pitched beep. It was annoying. He wanted it to stop.

He heard a male voice mutter something lowly. They'd noticed that he was conscious, watching them.

A moment later he felt himself drifting back into unconsciousness, but he did not try to fight against it. He was still alive, and his injuries were being tended to. That was enough for the moment.

…

"Where is he?" asked Nappa, glancing over at the boy as he hung onto his older brother. The long-haired Saiya-jin looked rather irked by his current circumstance.

It was bothersome. Even though the boy knew how to fly, he did not possess a sufficient amount of ki to enable him to fly any real distance. He'd had to make the trip clinging to Raditz and giving them vague and sometimes confused directions instead of being able to simply lead them to West City. Most annoyingly, he hadn't remembered until he'd been in midair and his energy had failed him, spent.

Glancing down at the city for a minute, he observed the almost complete lack of any indication of combat. Those must have been erased in that minor time shift he'd felt, but Vegeta's ki hadn't gone back to its pre-fight level. Something had prevented him from going back like everything else.

Finally his gaze settled on the Capsule Corp front lawn and the dark trail of blood that stretched all the way to the front door. That was probably the injury that had ended the fight.

He focused on the yellow building, searching for Vegeta's ki signature inside. "He's down there, but we—"

Nappa and Raditz suddenly dove towards the ground. "Stop! Stop! STOP!" yelled Goku, his voice almost becoming lost in the sound of rushing air.

Reluctantly the pair halted in their descent. "What?" asked Raditz in an irritated tone. "Are you going to throw up? I swear, if you do—"

"No. It's just…we shouldn't go down there yet."

"Why not?"

"That's the place Vegeta was going to. He's exactly where he wanted to be, and he won't want us to be there right away," he explained, adjusting his grip as he began to slip and trying his best to not pull his brother's hair. There was just so much of it.

"Eh?"

Regarding the boy for a moment, Nappa asked, "Does it have to do with the woman—the one he said was his wife in the future?"

"Yeah, he hasn't seen Bulma yet, and he wants to meet with her on his own first. If she remembers, he won't want us there." He paused, frowning thoughtfully before adding, "If she doesn't remember, he'll want us there even less."

That answer only seemed to irritate Raditz further. "What was the point of us even coming out here then?"

"There's lots of reasons," said Goku, seeming almost unaware of the man's darkening mood. "Vegeta's ki is really low right now, so it was hard to sense him. I couldn't tell where he was either. All of the other ki signatures I'm used to using to mark locations aren't there, so I didn't know if he made it to Capsule Corp or not. Also, there's the chance that the guy who attacked him could come back, and we wouldn't be any good to him back at my house."

"You can do that ki sense thing. Shouldn't you know if that person's around here?"

Shaking his head, he said, "He's hiding his ki. I can't tell if he's around here or not."

"Are you serious? How is being able to sense ki any more useful than the scouters if people can still hide from you?"

"Well…scouters break."

Releasing a resigned sigh, Nappa shook his head lightly. This conversation seemed to be getting away from the more important topic of the moment. "We need to find out exactly what happened, but we'll afford him the opportunity to speak with his woman first." It felt very strange to speak or even think about Vegeta having a wife. He couldn't quite get over thinking of him as a child who had no understanding of or interest in pursuing the opposite gender. "We'll find somewhere nearby to wait for our turn."

"Okay. I know where we can go," said Goku, gesturing in the direction he meant.

…

Pain!

He was in pain, lots of pain.

Slowly sucking in a breath that felt like hundreds of fiery needles being stabbed relentlessly into his chest, he let a low groan slip out between his lips. This was the part of being injured that he always hated the most.

Receiving the injuries was certainly painful, but the sensations were quickly dulled as endorphins released into his blood, allowing him to continue functioning through what would be crippling pain for others. It was another product of his people's evolution as a warrior race. Along with an accelerated rate of healing, the natural pain relievers his body produced were far more potent than those of humans.

Unfortunately, that also made it feel all the worse once their effect had worn off.

Opening his eyes, he squinted as they were assaulted by too bright light, but he did not let them close back. Stubbornly he forced them to remain open until they had adjusted and he could properly take in his surroundings.

He was in what looked like a rather typical hospital room: clean and impersonal. It was all smooth surfaces and cleans lines. Off to one side was a wooden table with a pair of chairs set at it. He noticed another chair sitting at his bedside. Someone had likely been sitting there at some point while he'd been unconscious.

Looking up at the plain, white ceiling, he frowned. He was alive.

Carefully he began to push himself up into a sitting position, using only his right arm, as the other had been put into an immobilizer to keep him from moving his shoulder as much as possible. That was one injury accounted for.

Once he was upright, he noticed that his clothes had been removed and that he was attired in nothing more than a thin, blue hospital gown, but that was of minimal concern. Pulling the collar, he looked down his front. There were large, splotchy bruises on his chest, and his stomach was wrapped in a layer of bandages that prevented him from seeing it.

Letting go of the collar, he reached down with his good hand, pressing gingerly, delicately on the wound. He winced slightly at the pain. It was much more sensitive than he had anticipated, but he could faintly feel through the bandages a line of stitches running across his abdomen. He pulled his fingers away, knowing that his prodding was doing nothing to aid his recovery. Slowly he lay back down.

It was inconvenient to heal like this. He was so accustomed to the accelerated methods of the regeneration tanks, senzu beans, and Dende's powers now. How long would it take for him to recover?

Longer.

That was the only thing he was certain of on the matter, and it was also the most frustrating thing. He didn't have time to waste on this. He'd met the person responsible for the time shift. The source of their problem was here, on Earth. Whatever means he'd used to manipulate time was obviously here as well. Everything was here!

Everything was there, and he was here, lying uselessly in bed. It was infuriating!

With his uninjured arm, he pounded against the mattress, ceasing when the action jarred his ribs painfully and only increasing his frustration at the situation. He cursed under his breath, the urge to destroy something quickly rising within him. If he didn't think it would make him pass out again, he might've shot a small ki blast at the table and chairs.

Forcing his anger down, he sighed both in irritation and resignation. There was nothing to be done about it.

Staring up at the ceiling, he reached out with his ki sense, searching for the signatures of his fellow Saiya-jins. He found them easily enough. They had moved. They were only a few miles away from him now—a few minutes flight at worst.

At least they had seen fit not to come in on him while he was still unconscious. He wondered what sort of spluttering excuse Goku had come up with to convince Nappa to wait. It must be killing him, not being able to tell what was going on.

He frowned almost guiltily at that thought. There were many things about his past that he certainly wasn't proud of, but there were very few things that he actually regretted. With everything he'd done, there was simply too much. If he were allow himself to feel regret over everything he'd done, he would quickly be consumed by it all.

Killing Nappa, he supposed, was one of those things he did regret doing.

Things had been different then. He'd been different. Nappa had been different too. At some point, he'd been broken and become that brutish fool who'd died on this planet.

When had it happened? Vegeta couldn't identify the exact moment. Perhaps it had been a gradual decline, or maybe it had been a sudden snap. He hadn't noticed it until afterwards, and by then, he hadn't cared about it beyond whether the man would be an asset or a liability to his goals.

He hadn't been broken. He'd been damaged almost from the beginning. That had made things both easier and harder for him. Instead of resisting his situation, he had adapted to it, incorporating the brutality and mercilessness he'd experienced into himself. Unfortunately, having adapted so well to that circumstance, he'd been nearly incapable of functioning when his situation had done an abrupt one-eighty.

Starting slightly at the sound of a door opening, he looked over to see the seemingly almost unchanged figure of Dr. Briefs walking into the room. He even appeared to have the same black cat perched atop his shoulder. Just how old was that thing?

"Oh, you're awake already," he said upon noticing that the boy was watching him, shuffling into the room and allowing the door to swing closed behind him.

"I just woke up," he answered in a rough, painful croak. He reached up, grabbing his throat lightly, remembering that it had nearly been crushed as his fingers brushed over bruised flesh.

"Don't force yourself to speak if it feels like it's too difficult. I could get a pen and notepad if that would be easier for you," he suggested helpfully, beginning to edge back towards the door he'd entered through.

"No."

"Are you certain?"

The man's concern bothered him, made him uncomfortable. It wasn't right. It wasn't how the Dr. Briefs who knew him would have behaved. "Yes. How long was I out?"

"You were unconscious for just over a day," he answered, moving towards the bed again. "That you're alive at all is nothing short of miraculous. You'd lost so much blood by the time we got you into the hospital wing that the doctors weren't certain there was anything they could do to save you."

"I don't die easy."

For a moment the man looked vaguely amused by his response, but his expression suddenly became serious in a way that Vegeta hadn't he was capable of. "What happened to you?"

"I was attacked."

"By whom?"

"I don't know. I didn't get a good look at him, and I don't what his purpose was except that he meant to kill me," he answered, turning his gaze away from the man, wearing an almost bored expression. This wasn't the conversation he wanted to be having right now. He needed to find Bulma and talk with her about—

"The dragonball!" yelled Vegeta suddenly, sitting sharply upright and regretting it immediately afterwards as he jarred his ribs and his stomach. "W-where is it?" he asked as he doubled over in pain, clutching his middle.

Dr. Briefs was quickly at his bedside, carefully grasping his shoulder and lifting him back upright before gently pushing him back into a fully horizontal position. He checked to see that the boy hadn't managed to tear his abdomen open again, looking almost apologetic at the pained noises his actions elicited. "You need to be more careful. Don't move around too roughly or you'll break your stitches and start bleeding again. You haven't recovered your normal blood volume yet either."

"Where's the dragonball?" he persisted, looking almost panicked as his eyes darted around the room. He couldn't have lost it. He couldn't afford to have lost it! "I had it before I passed out. Where is it?"

He attempted to sit up again, pushing against the pain and the man trying to hold him down. "Calm down. Is this what you're looking for?" he asked, reaching with one hand for something that lay beyond Vegeta's field of vision.

A moment later the hand pulled back into his view, holding an orange ball with four red stars clearly displayed on its surface. His struggles ceased almost immediately.

"Yes, that's it." His eyelids seemed to droop tiredly, his severely depleted energy spent for the moment.

Seeing that the boy had calmed back down, Dr. Briefs cautiously removed the hand that had been holding onto his uninjured shoulder. He didn't try to sit up again. "I'll leave it here, on the bedside table, for you. Now, please don't make any sudden movements like that again. You have some very serious injuries—you nearly died, and you're not free and clear yet."

He gave a half-hearted grunt in response, feeling himself beginning to drift back off to sleep again. A part of him tried to fight it off. There were things that he needed to get done, but that sleepy warmth was so inviting.

What was this? Since when was he so undisciplined that he could be lured in by such a simple prospect of comfort? He should be furious with himself for it, but he couldn't muster it.

Was it so bad? Giving in just this once?

He barely registered the sound of the door opening again. It was probably just Dr. Briefs deciding to leave and let him be for a while. "So this is where you are," said a young female voice, jolting him back to full consciousness.

It was her!

Looking out through half-closed eyes, he saw a girl with blue hair pulled back and done up in a braid standing in the doorway, smiling at her father with bright blue eyes. She was wearing a white shirt with her name printed across it in light purple lettering and a skirt that was that same shade of purple. Over one shoulder she was carrying a school bag, giving him some idea of where she'd just come from. The idea of her going to school seemed somehow even more ridiculous than Trunks going to school.

"Yes, I wanted to check on how our young guest was doing. You can come in, but please keep your noise level down. I think he's almost back to sleep."

She looked over at him curiously, brow furrowing slightly as she began to walk towards him. "So this kid is what all that fuss was about the other night. He's smaller than I'd expected from all that blood he left outside. He's really a bit of a runt."

Biting the inside of his cheek to keep from giving himself away, Vegeta fought to keep his expression neutral. He was really getting sick of this.

"How's he doing? What happened to him?"

"He said that he was attacked but didn't get a decent look at his assailant. It's too bad. He fell back asleep before I could ask him anything else, so we still don't even know his name."

Continuing to look at him curiously, Bulma leaned against the raised railing at the side of the bed. "Still, he's kind of cute like this. He's so small and kind of vulnerable-looking," she commented after a moment, lips pulling up into a smile, and Vegeta wondered whether she was intentionally taunting him. Did she remember and was just saying those things because she knew he would hate them?

"He is, so be gentle around him for now," said Dr. Briefs, turning and beginning his slow shuffle towards the door. "I have some things in the lab that need my attention, but you may stay down here a bit longer if you want. Maybe he'll wake up again, and you can ask his name and how we can get in touch with his parents. They must be quite worried about him by now."

She nodded her head as she watched her father depart. Once the door had swung closed behind him, she looked back, wearing an almost mischievous smile. "So how long are you going to keep the act up?"

"You noticed," he remarked, opening his eyes fully.

"You reacted when I called you a runt."

He scowled. "I'm not a runt."

"Really? So how old are you then? Seven? Eight?"

"More like twelve."

"No way! You're way too puny to be older than me!"

"I'm not puny! I'm not a runt or small or short or little! I'm a perfectly normal height for my age, for what I am." Forget that he was short in adulthood. He was slightly small on human terms, but in regards to Saiya-jins he was something close to a good foot below what was considered average.

"What you are?"

"Yes, what I…" He trailed off as realization dawned on him. If she was asking this sort of question, she didn't have any memory of the future.

She didn't have any memory of him.

He looked away from her, dark eyes growing suddenly distant and cold. Something in his demeanor seemed to shrink and withdraw from her, becoming much more closed off from her. "Nothing. Forget it."

"That's not fair. You can't just say something like that and then not bother to explain it. What? Tell me what you are," insisted Bulma in her usual stubborn way, wanting to know what he'd been about to tell her and why he'd so suddenly changed his mind. It was nice to know that at least some part of her would always be the same.

"It wouldn't mean anything to you," he said, trying to turn away from her, but he couldn't manage it because doing so would've forced him to lie on his injured shoulder. "Don't you have some questions your father wanted me to answer?"

Bulma didn't immediately answer him, and he could almost hear the debate going on in her head. Did she push the questions she really wanted him to answer, or did she stick with the ones he would be more likely to answer?

Pushing a breath out forcefully between her lips, she asked, "What's you name?"

"Vegeta."

"Vegeta what?"

"Just Vegeta. My people don't use surnames."

"Oh. Well, how are we supposed to get in touch with your parents to tell them where you are and that you're alive?"

"You're not."

"Why not? Did you have a fight with them or something…" She trailed off and he could almost feel the sudden shift in her attitude. "Were they the ones who did—"

"My parents are dead."

She fell silent again. He waited for her to say something else or ask another question, but she didn't. As the silence continued to drag on, his tail began to twitch, the fur bristling slightly. Why was she being so damn quiet? This wasn't how the Bulma he knew behaved. It was putting him on edge.

"What's that?" she asked only a moment before he felt fingers wrap lightly around his tail. "Ooh. It's really soft."

A slight flush stained his cheeks at that comment even as he tuned his head back around and snapped, "Let go of that!"

Grip tightening ever-so-slightly on the furry appendage, which twitched and wriggled, trying to slip out of her hand, she asked, "Why should I listen to you if you won't tell me what it is?"

"It's mine," he hissed out through gritted teeth. Even though she wasn't holding it tight enough to hurt him, he couldn't stand the feeling of it in her grasp. There was simply too much unpleasantness associated with it. "Now, let go of my tail!"

"Your…tail?!" she asked in a perplexed but fascinated tone. It certainly looked like a tail, but that was just silly. Boys didn't have tails.

Did they?

Her father didn't have one, but maybe it was something boys lost when they grew into adults. No, that didn't make any sense either. None of the boys she knew from school had tails. At least, as far as she knew, they didn't, if they were all as sensitive as this one was about it being touched, maybe they hid their tails beneath their clothes. She'd never seen a boy naked before, so how much did she really know on the matter?

"Could they?" she wondered aloud, absently beginning to stroke the boy's tail as she continued to ponder the possibility. The fur felt so soft and nice.

Vegeta gasped, breath catching in his throat as a sensation of pure pleasure washed over him, and for a moment all conscious thought ceased. It had been so long. He'd forgotten how truly wonderful such a light, gentle touch on his tail could feel. No one had handled it in such a way since he'd been very young and his parents had been trying to make him settle down to put him to sleep. As an adult, he'd desensitized it to the point that he wouldn't have reacted this way even if he would've allowed anyone the chance to touch it.

The trade-off had certainly made sense then. No amount of potential pleasure had been worth the risk of being rendered so incredibly vulnerable. There'd been too many dangers, too many enemies.

Maybe in a more secure environment he would have considered leaving it be, or maybe he wouldn't have desensitized it so completely. It had been almost completely without feeling before it had been cut off. He'd done so much damage to it just to keep people from being able to exploit it as a weakness.

Fingers stopped their motions, and he quickly came back to his senses. "You have no right to do that!" he shouted, snatching his tail away from her. He glared at her, looking both highly offended and faintly regretful.

"You didn't seem to mind while I was doing it."

"That doesn't count! You have no place to go grabbing my tail."

"So it really is a tail? Do all boys have them?"

"Are you an idiot? What kind of stupid question is that?"

"Don't call me an idiot!"

"Don't act like one then!"

With an infuriated growl, Bulma swung her hand around to smack him across the face, but Vegeta caught her by the wrist before she could even touch him. She paused for a moment, seeming shocked, but she quickly began trying to pull her hand free. No luck. She tried again, tugging against his grip, but it quickly became apparent that she was firmly caught in his grasp. The irony of the sudden change in their positions did not escape her.

"Now wasn't that an idiotic thing to do?" asked Vegeta in a mocking tone. "Didn't your father say you needed to be gentle around me right now? I don't think hitting counts as being gentle."

"Jerk. Let go!" He wasn't hurting her. He wasn't squeezing her wrist too tightly. In fact, he didn't seem to be exerting any effort at all to keep a hold of her. "Let go of me, you…you stupid monkey!"

The grip on her wrist suddenly tightened, squeezing painfully and with more strength than the boy seemed like he should be capable of. Don't call me that!" he snarled at her, forcing himself to sit upright again. "There's nothing I can do about it right now when that bastard and his lackeys call me a monkey, but I refuse to put up with it from anyone else!"

Her curiosity was piqued, and the pain was momentarily forgotten. "Who?"

Dark eyes widened as he realized what he'd said, and he suddenly shoved her away. Bulma stumbled backwards a few paces before losing her balance completely and falling gracelessly on her bottom.

"Go away," he said in a flat voice.

She looked up at him, torn between anger and curiosity so that she could only manage a half-glare at him, but he wasn't looking at her anymore. He was staring down at the blankets covering his lower half, wearing a strained, almost disheartened expression. "Who calls you a monkey?" she asked as she stood back up.

He didn't respond.

"Is it the same person who hurt you?"

"You don't know what you're talking about. Go away." At least he'd said something that time. That was progress, right?

"Were you trying to run away?"

No! He wasn't running away. He didn't run away. Who did she think he was, implying that he would do something like that?

She thought he was some skinny, undersized kid with a tail, of course. As far as she was concerned, he was just some weird kid who'd happened to nearly bleed to death on her front lawn. Maybe he was someone of interest to her, but he was no one special to her.

Looking back at her, he took in everything about her. It was her, but at the same time, it wasn't her. Standing before him was a girl who'd likely had no experience other than the soft, pampered life her father's fortune had provided for her. This wasn't the woman who'd experienced the fear of inevitable death and the relief of surviving a seemingly hopeless situation. She hadn't launched herself into space or witnessed her friends being killed. This wasn't the woman who had loved and accepted him when all logic and reason said that she should have hated and reviled him. "Why don't you remember?"

"Remember? What are you talking about? We've never met before," she said, frowning almost uncertainly as his gaze continued to linger on her.

"No, we haven't. We shouldn't be meeting now either."

"You're not making any—Hey!" she shouted as he began to pull the various wires and tubes from his body with his good arm. He threw off the blankets and began to carefully push himself towards the edge of the bed. "What're you doing?"

"What does it look like? I'm leaving," he said through gritted teeth as he gingerly lowered himself onto the floor, resting most of his weight on his uninjured leg. He clung to the bed for a moment as his head swam. He was really in poor condition. "I can't stand it here."

"You're insane!" she shouted, moving to stand directly in his way. "You can't go anywhere with the way you are right now. How can you even manage to stand upright?"

"Willpower. Now, move."

"No!"

"Either you move on your own, or I will move you," he said, choosing not to think about how idiotic and reckless he was being. What could he really hope to achieve through this? How far did he actually expect to get before his body gave out on him? "I can't stay here. I can't be here, with you."

When she refused to move out of his way, Vegeta released the bed, pausing for a moment as he felt his legs wobble unstably for a moment. He frowned, pushing her with just enough force to make her move back a couple of steps. Delicately he began to walk past her, moving towards the door.

"Wait!" she exclaimed, and he felt hands grasp his tail again, squeezing and pulling it tightly in en effort to make him listen. All of the strength went out of his legs, and he collapsed onto the floor, clumsily trying to catch himself with his right arm and failing.

Sharp pain shot through both his midsection and his chest, leaving him unable to breathe for a moment. "Bulma," he gasped, trying to look at her as best he could.

"Are you okay?" she asked, ignoring for a moment both how stupid that question sounded and that he'd never been told her name. She knelt down on the floor, trying to help him back into an upright position. "I told you not to try to leave."

"Check my stomach."

"Your sto—you're bleeding! I'm sorry! I didn't mean to—"

"Bulma!"

"What?"

"Don't waste time apologizing. Go get your father or one of the nurses. Just leave me here for now."

"Are you sure—"

"Dammit! GO!"

She released him immediately, leaving him in an awkward half-upright position on the floor that it was too painful for him to move out of on his own. Her footsteps pounded against the floor as she ran, pausing just long enough for her to fling the door open and race into the hallway. The door banged loudly against the wall, making him flinch slightly at the loud noise, and a few seconds later it slammed shut again, leaving him alone. For another moment he could hear her shouts as she raced along the hall, but eventually that faded into silence as well. "Fuck."

* * *

_What? You were expecting things to go smoothly for him? Yeah, right. When does that ever happen?_

_Thank you to Whatev3691 (Well, I just try to make it something enjoyable, and for me, if a story becomes too predictable, it stops being interesting.), j. (It seemed like we needed to meet the person responsible for the time shift about now otherwise the story would've started to really drag. Besides, it was any easy way for me to answer questions about who was responsible without actually giving much of anything away.), kitsuK8 (He got beaten up, but I don't know about Bulma nursing him back to health. She kinda just made things worse…not that Vegeta was doing himself any favors to begin with.), XxKuroyoxX, kitsuneluvuh, GoldenRat (It's rather something of a requirement to have him beaten up by the bad guy at least once, isn't it? Maybe he just gets beaten up so much because at the level everyone's at right now, he's the only one who really can take a serious beating.), GCTIGERFAN1, Adnawun (I'm glad you're liking the rewrite. Things are about to make really big changes from the original version though.), Lucillia (You'll just have to wait to see what happens with that. You're not the only one who wants those two to stay around.), Obelisk of Light (You know, I had an old story where I actually did kill Vegeta. That was fun…er, but I did bring him back. He was only dead for a couple chapters.), Scarlet Amaranth (It ended there because that seemed like a perfectly good place to cut off the narrative…and because it was more fun for me to make everyone wait to find out what happened.), AzureFlames, heyhey, mynameisthedoctor (Yes, that is a really great line. That's why it stayed completely unaltered from the original version.), ljv (At least the fight served a purpose in the story and wasn't just for the sake of having Vegeta get beaten up. His being injured is actually more inconvenient than if he'd gotten to talk with Bulma in the previous chapter, but I really felt like I needed to introduce the person responsible for the time change.), and hopelessly_demented for reviewing the previous chapter. Again, I'm sorry for taking so long with this one._


	13. Chapter Thirteen

_So a lot of things have happened since last month. I got a job, and I've also found an apartment for the next year. That's some spiffy news, and that's not the end of it either. Just a couple weeks after starting my new job, I also got an offer for another job when I managed to out-geek the manager at GameStop on (get this!) Dragonball trivia. It all started because a couple of customers were debating over buying one of the DBZ games._

_Also, apparently I'm going to Anime Weekend Atlanta (AWA) this year. Originally I didn't think I was going to be able to afford it, but one of my friends was able to get us an incredible discount on a hotel room since he works for the chain. Maybe some of you guys are planning on going too. Yes, I'm planning on doing a bit of cosplay, but it won't be anything from Dragonball._

_Life feels rather strange but also amusing right now. Let's hope it stays that way for a while._

* * *

**Chapter Thirteen**

It had been a very tiring day.

Plopping down in his favorite chair, Dr. Briefs released a long sigh, allowing himself to sink deeper into the cushions. On his shoulder, his ever-present feline companion made a small noise of complaint as he was pushed uncomfortably into the chair back. He readjusted himself on his perch, being none too gentle with his claws as he did so, but the man made no fuss about it, staring up at the ceiling with a pensive expression on his face.

The boy.

When the boy—Vegeta, he reminded himself—had shown up on his front step, a bleeding and broken mess, he'd had him immediately rushed to the hospital wing of the compound, but he'd mentally already written the child off as dead. He'd lost so much blood.

Somehow, he'd survived it, condition stabilizing almost on its own. The doctors and nurses had been baffled and amazed by it. Of course, as soon as he'd woken up, he managed to re-open the most serious of his injuries after little more than a day's worth of recovery time. That he'd managed to survive that as well wasn't quite as amazing, however, as the amount of healing his body had made in that short amount of time. It seemed almost beyond human capabilities.

Even so, the boy was quite a concerning matter. He had apparently been trying to leave when he'd torn the wound in his abdomen back open. What had made him so desperate to leave even in his current condition?

Unfortunately, the boy was refusing to answer that or any other questions now, and that was even more concerning due to a number of things he'd said to Bulma. Both of his parents were dead, he was severely undersized for the age he claimed to be, and his reaction to being called a "monkey" was worryingly violent.

His behavior upon waking up had been highly unusual as well. He hadn't seemed confused or afraid about waking up in an unfamiliar place and being met by an unfamiliar man. Vegeta also hadn't once said anything about being in pain and had seemed to almost have forgotten about his injuries altogether until he'd suddenly sat up, trying to find that "dragonball" he'd been carrying with him before.

He hadn't reacted to the pain beyond the actual sensation of it either. Most children would have begun screaming or crying, but he hadn't done any of that even when he'd torn his stitches. There was almost nothing normal in the way this boy behaved.

Of course, there was a bit of a question about just how "normal" a boy with a furry, brown tail and gravity defying hair could be to begin with. Dr. Briefs had never seen anything like him before, and the scientist part of him wondered if he might've happened upon some great new discovery.

What exactly had he discovered though? Was the boy some sort of hybrid of human and anima, or could he be part of an entirely different race that had simply gone undiscovered until now? He was curious, but he knew that he couldn't allow himself to get carried away by that curiosity. Amazing discovery or not, the boy's recovery needed to be the primary concern for now.

The sound of the doorbell ringing brought him back to reality, and he groaned slightly in displeasure. He waited, debating whether or not it was worth getting out of his chair for. As the bell rang again, he decided that he should probably answer it and reluctantly got back to his feet.

Dr. Briefs frowned as he opened the door, looking up. And up. And up to meet the decidedly unfriendly gaze of the massive man standing on the other side. He didn't think he'd ever seen someone who was so simply enormous. "Oh, my…"

"Excuse me." He looked down, following the direction the voice had seemed to come from. Standing on the front step was a young boy with wild, black hair that stuck out in every direction and a furry, brown tail waving in the air behind him. "Hi. We're looking for Vegeta. Is he here?"

"Vegeta…?" He looked hesitantly back up at the large man. Should he tell them? The boy didn't seem to be any danger, but this giant of a man looked as though he could crush the injured boy without even trying. Could he be the one who'd attacked him? "I'm sorry, but—"

"Dr. Briefs?" asked a female voice behind him.

He looked over his shoulder. It was one of the nurses who'd been assigned to take shifts watching Vegeta in case he decided to start talking or tried to leave again. She looked quite confounded and a little afraid.

"Yes? What is it?"

"The…the patient said to tell you that there are some people here to see him and that you should go ahead and bring them to him. H-he also…said to tell them that they're being bothersome pests for racing to him over something so minor," she said in a shaky voice as she stared fearfully at the large man behind the doctor. He looked so fearsome. "Th-that is all, sir!"

Quickly she spun around and practically ran away.

Slowly he looked back at the newcomers, feeling no more reassured but greatly interested. That boy was becoming more and more of a curiosity. How had he known that they were here?

"You heard her," said the giant, looking no less menacing for the smirk on his face. "The boy wants to see us. It's best not to keep him waiting."

"Of course. Right this way," he said, allowing them as well as another man he hadn't been able to see before through the door. Belatedly, he noticed that the two men were wearing what at first appeared to be fuzzy belts, but he promptly realized what they must really be. They were the same as Vegeta.

He ignored the nurse telling him that he needed to remain lying down as he carefully but insistently pushed himself up into a sitting position, using the pillows as an aid to help prop himself up a bit more. The fresh stitches in his stomach were enough of a reminder to be careful in his movements. Certainly it was more effective than this woman speaking to him like he was some especially dull-witted five year old.

She just didn't understand it. He didn't want them to see him in such a pathetic state, and since he couldn't hide his condition completely, he would do his best to minimize the apparent severity of it. It was part instinct, majority pride.

Looking over at the door as it swung open, he shot a half-hearted glare at his fellow Saiya-jins as they entered. It was expected of him, but any genuine anger he felt over their arrival was somewhat tempered by the fact that they had some things they really did need to discuss.

"Leave," he said, directing his gaze momentarily at the nurse, who seemed absolutely astonished as the men walked into the room, moving to stand at the boy's bedside. Goku scrambled up to hang easily off of the bed's footboard, grinning like an idiot. She'd been convinced that he was becoming delirious when he'd begun insisting that there were people here to see him. Now, she wasn't so certain that she wasn't the one who'd lost touch with reality.

Ducking her head and mumbling something, she hurried out of the room at a fast walk, trying to maintain some amount of dignity. As the door closed behind her, Raditz let out a low chuckle.

"You look like hell."

"It looks worse than it really is."

"The man said you were nearly dead when he found you," said Nappa in a tone heavy with reproach.

"Humans have a tendency to exaggerate the severity of such things. A near disembowelment will make anyone look 'nearly dead'," he said with a quick glance at Goku that warned him not to say anything about how close to dying he'd actually come. The almost sheepish grin he received in answer told him that it was already too late for that kind of damage control.

"Is that what you tore open trying to leave?"

"Don't lecture me. I'm not a child."

"Mentally, I'll give, but physically, you are very much a child." Vegeta visibly tensed at that statement and opened his mouth as though to argue, but he quickly shut it back. What could he say? "Your body as it is now does not belong to a grown man."

"I know that," he growled out, right hand fisting in the bed sheets. "I just couldn't stand to stay here."

"That's a stupid reason," said Raditz, looking almost pleased that he was getting the opportunity to criticize the boy for a change.

He responded with a derisive snort and a roll of his eyes. "It's no more stupid than your reason for almost not coming to this planet. Remember that? You'd probably already be dead by now if you had stayed behind." It didn't matter that he'd known it was an idiotic thing to do at the time as well. He certainly wasn't going to agree with them out loud, especially when it was Raditz criticizing him.

"So who attacked you?" asked Goku, changing the topic of conversation quickly. His tail curled behind him like a question mark.

"I don't know. I didn't get a very good look at him, and he didn't bother identifying himself for me," said Vegeta, brow furrowing as he mentally replayed the fight, attempting to recall useful details that could be used to identify his attacker with. Silently he cursed his own poor performance in that meeting. Being caught off guard could only excuse so much. "He had four arms, which is a distinctive enough feature by itself on this planet. There was also one point where he was standing over me, and I saw what I think were a pair of eyestalks, judging from the way they were moving. He had a third eye in the center of his face. That should be plenty to recognize him from."

"Was he the guy who made the time shift?"

"Yes."

"Did you see how he does it?"

He shook his head, expression taking on a hint of annoyance at his failure to catch such a critical detail. "No, but he had to have the means for it on his person at the time. That says a couple of important things: whatever he uses is small enough that he can carry it with him and inconspicuous enough not to attract too much attention."

"So it's not like the time machine."

"It's completely different from that method. The way that worked was by moving through time, but this guy is just moving time backwards altogether," explained Vegeta, wearing a grim expression that left no question as to the seriousness of the matter. "When he shifted time while holding on to me, we went back to the moment before he initially attacked me. If it had been like the time machine, there would have been a past version of myself as well as the present version, but there was only the latter. That means we're affecting our own timeline rather than creating a divergent one."

"…What?" asked the younger boy, tilting his head slightly to one side.

Growling in irritation at Goku for having wasted his whole explanation and at himself for not having known better, he shouted, "We're changing our futures!"

That he seemed to understand. "So how do we fix it?"

"One way or another, we'll need to stop him from being able to shift time, but we should try to obtain whatever means he uses for ourselves. We don't really know if the dragonballs will be powerful enough for this." He glanced briefly at the door, giving a quick snort and looking away again.

"So what are these dragonball things?" asked Raditz, looking at the orange orb that still sat on the bedside table. "You guys make them sound really special and important, but you never explained anything about them."

Goku quickly jumped in, deciding to take over the explanation. "They're seven magic balls. They each have a different number of red stars on them, and they're spread out all over the planet. When you get them all together, you can summon the dragon, and he'll grant you and one wish that's in his power."

"It sounds like some ridiculous fairy-tale, I know," admitted Vegeta, acknowledging the dubious expressions the older men were regarding them with. "But these things are legitimate magical objects. I've seen them bring people back from the dead. Did you hear that clearly enough out there, girl?"

There was a moment of stunned silence before the door swung slowly open, revealing a slightly red-faced Bulma, embarrassed at having been caught eavesdropping. "When did you notice me?"

"From the beginning. You can't sneak around me."

"How much did you overhear?" asked Nappa, looking down at the girl with a critical eye. He assumed that this was the girl Vegeta had nearly gotten himself killed just to see. This was the girl he eventually took for his wife.

"She heard about the dragonballs. What are you here for?"

"You don't have to answer for me," said the girl in a rather snappish tone, but her expression quickly seemed to soften a bit. She looked almost apologetic. "I came to see if you were okay after what happened."

"In spite of your best efforts, I'll live."

Bulma glared at the floor for a minute. Maybe she hadn't helped things by grabbing his tail, but he shouldn't have been trying to leave in the first place. He was at least as much at fault as she was. "Are you serious about those dragon things? Do they really grant wishes?"

"They do."

Bulma looked back at him, biting her bottom lip in thought. "How are you going to find them? Your friend said they were scattered over the planet. Do you have any way of finding the others?"

"Not really," he answered in a most casual tone. This was why he hadn't called attention to her presence sooner. "The balls emit some sort of low energy wave, so they react when they're in close proximity to each other. We don't have anything more specific than that though."

"Are you serious? You'll never find six more if that's the best you've got."

"You have something better?" asked Raditz with a derisive snort.

Now she was smirking up at him. "Not yet, but I can get something better."

"What?"

"You may not know it, but I am a genius just like my father. I know I can make something that can track the energy signal of those balls to help you find the rest. All you have to do is let me borrow that one you already have to use as reference."

"How do we know you won't just take it and use it for yourself?"

"You really don't have a clue of who I am, do you? My dad is one of the wealthiest men in the world. Whatever I want, he can buy or create for me, so I don't need to go chasing after magical dragons for a silly wish."

Goku laughed and Vegeta snorted at that remark. While only the younger Saiya-jin had actually been present for it, they both knew of her original search for the dragonballs. Apparently daddy's money hadn't been able to get her the perfect boyfriend. Silently, mutually, they decided not to comment on that particular matter.

"I just have one condition."

"What?" asked Vegeta, looking as though he already had a decent idea of exactly what that condition would be.

"I want to come with you guys to see the dragon."

"No."

"Don't be so mean. Let me come," she whined, trying her best to persuade him with a pout and watery eyes. Those never worked in the future either.

"But didn't you just say you didn't want to go chasing after magical dragons?" asked Goku in confusion.

"I said that I didn't need to go for a wish, but that doesn't mean I don't want to go along just to see it. Adventures like this don't come along very often. Who knows when an opportunity like this is going to come along for me again?"

"About five years or so," retorted Vegeta dryly. "No."

She frowned in a familiar stubborn expression, leveling her best glare at the boy, who seemed completely unphased by it. If he wouldn't be swayed by pouting, she would try a different method of persuasion. "Either you can agree to take me with you, or you can forget about getting any help from me! What's your decision now?"

"You've got a lot of nerve, making demands of us when you haven't even given us any indication that you can deliver on your end. I want to see this tracking device before I even start to consider making deals with you, girl," said the boy, wearing an irritated expression that didn't seem to quite match up with the tone of his voice. He sounded more like he was taunting her, challenging her with full confidence that she would rise to meet it. It was confusing and strangely infuriating to her.

"You jerk! I'll show you what Bulma Briefs can do, and then you'll be begging me to come along!"

"People like us are not so impressed by words," said Nappa in a very matter of fact tone as he picked up the dragonball. He rolled it over in his hand, looking at it contemplatively. After a moment he tossed it to the girl, who fumbled with it a couple of times before managing to actually catch it. "Act if you want consideration."

Bulma grinned triumphantly as she spun around and darted out of the room, proclaiming, "You'll see!"

The door swung shut again. "She's not coming."

"That's for you to deal with. She's quite strong-willed."

"You have no idea."

"Is she really as smart as she says?" asked Raditz after a moment.

"No, she's smarter than that…on most days, anyway."

"She must suit you well," commented the bald man, wearing a faintly amused expression.

Vegeta gave a non-committal grunt, glancing back at the door as it was opened yet again. He was becoming rather tired of so many people coming and going from his room as they pleased. They didn't even bother to knock first.

He blanched as he saw the familiar, absently smiling face of Bulma's mother standing in the doorway. Mentally, he hastily recanted his previous thoughts about almost missing the woman and her strange ways. Almost unconsciously he began to lean over slightly, trying to hide himself behind Nappa's much larger frame. He was no coward, but there was little else he could do to try to avoid her.

"My goodness! What a handsome group of visitors we have," she declared as she walked in, carrying a tray with a pitcher of water and four glasses balanced delicately on one arm. "If I weren't a married woman, I might just have to take my chances with you two."

Raditz and Nappa exchanged uncomfortable glances and seemed to in unison lean slightly away from the woman as she approached the group. She only continued to smile.

"I was just thinking that I needed to make a trip down to the hospital wing to visit our little patient." Here the fur on Vegeta's tail bristled slightly, but he didn't say anything as Mrs. Briefs continued her chattering. "Just as I was about to come, my husband told me that three people had arrived to see him, and I knew that I couldn't just come down here empty-handed. What kind of hostess would that make me? Unfortunately, I didn't have anything prepared for a group at the moment, and it would be horribly rude of me to bring something for just one or two of you with nothing for the others. So I settled on simply bringing something for you to drink to start with."

She set the tray down on the table and poured out four glasses of water, which she distributed amongst the Saiya-jins almost before they had even managed to process what she'd actually said in the midst of that babble of words. "Also, I didn't even know if you gentlemen would want anything, and I didn't want to bring something just to have it go to waste."

No one said anything.

Undeterred by their silence, Mrs. Briefs turned her full attention on Vegeta, who looked distinctly as though he was considering ripping out his stitches again just to get away from her. "Poor dear. You look like it's been ages since you ate a decent meal. Are you hungry?"

Her question was answered by not one but four stomachs growling in sudden demand. She looked around at the four of them in amazement before suddenly giggling and saying, "I guess you'd all like something after all. Do you have any requests?"

"Make whatever you want," answered Vegeta, glancing into his glass. "We're not picky eaters. Just make a lot."

She beamed at that. "Don't you worry about a thing. I'll make as much as you want." With that she turned and flitted out of the room, leaving the two older Saiya-jins very confused and somewhat concerned about staying here. The promise of as much food as they wanted, however, gave them pause. Even if the woman was insane, that could be somewhat overlooked if she was a decent cook and could hold up to that promise.

In the end, their stomachs won the fight.

* * *

_And that's another chapter down. _

_I'm kind of mixed on my feelings about this chapter. There are some parts I rather like about it, and there are some other parts I'm just kind of "meh" about._

_Thanks to Lady-Indis, Unlisshed (I appreciate you breaking out of that and giving me a review.), XxKuroyoxX (Well, as far as we've seen, Bulma's always been a rather stubborn and argumentative person, so it made sense to me that they'd still clash a bit.), j., kitsuK8 (No, it won't morph into a story focusing only on them, but I will probably give them a bit more interaction. This story definitely needs more Goku, Nappa, and Raditz. That's something I'll probably try to bring in with the new stuff coming up.), kitsuneluvuh (Well, it's easy enough to keep Nappa and Raditz in character when I'm basically inventing most of their characterization. Goku's the only one I worry that I don't quite manage at times.), Animeluvr17 (Heh. I actually excised one short joke from this chapter. Of course, I ended up making up for it with Mrs. Briefs.), Sufjan Tweedy (Wow. Reading this whole thing on an iPod screen really takes dedication. I'm impressed.), Whatev3691 (It's all about balance. Slower chapters are good for development and explanations, but faster paced chapters are what keep the plot moving forward.), GCTIGERFAN1, Obelisk of Light (I wanted the beginning of their interaction to be a bit ambiguous so that you really got to discover that she didn't remember along with him. I won't say it was a success, but I think it came out okay.), AzureFlames (Sorry you couldn't get a proper review in.), Nameless Boast (Really, I enjoy long reviews. I'm trying to take my time a bit with this story, but it can be really hard to not rush it sometimes. Of course, writing the character interactions is also really fun to me, which, I think, helps me a bit to not rush the writing.), and mynameisthedoctor for reviewing. Hopefully it won't be too long a wait before the next chapter is ready._


	14. Chapter Fourteen

_So real life got in the way of my writing again…along with a bit of writer's block. Yeah. That was loads of fun…_

_Anyway, this chapter is really short, and not a whole lot happens. Let's just call it a bit of an interlude. I originally had an entirely different plan for this chapter, but it didn't turn out at all. I'm not sure what I hoped to accomplish with this chapter except that I wanted to have a bit more interaction between Goku, Raditz, and Nappa. It's surprisingly hard to write the three of them without Vegeta being around since he's really the only thing they all have to relate over. Even without being present, he still managed to intrude on their conversation._

_Well, I've already gotten a decent start on the next chapter, so hopefully it will be ready and up in time. Until then, this will have to suffice._

_**Note: **Sorry everyone! For some reason removed all of my quotation marks. I think it's fixed now._

* * *

**Chapter Fourteen**

"You and your brother can use this room while you're all staying here," said Mrs. Briefs, pushing open the door to show the Saiya-jins their temporary accommodations. The room was rather plainly decorated, using mostly neutral colors but with a few splashes of brightness to add a bit of interest. It contained a pair of beds, a single bedside table between them, and a set of drawers as the extent of its furnishings.

Goku and Raditz walked into the room, the elder sibling watching the woman warily as he slipped through the door past her. Something about her and that constant smile automatically put him on edge. Her shameless attempts to flirt with both himself and Nappa despite already having a husband didn't make it any better.

"It's nice," he said somewhat uncertainly, looking around at the room. What else was he supposed to say?

"Oh, you're too sweet," she gushed, seeming not to notice as Nappa gave a derisive snort behind her. "It's nothing fancy, I know, but these rooms are closer to your little friend, and I figured that you wouldn't want to be too far away from him."

He looked the room over again. Even if it was very basic by her standards, it was still far nicer than what he was accustomed to having. This sort of place almost seemed like luxury, leaving him feel rather strangely like a country hick even though by all counts the people of this planet were supposed to be the backwater bumpkins.

"Anyway, the bathroom is just two doors down the hall and on your left. I've already made sure that there are plenty of toiletries and linens for you to use, but feel free to come to me if you still need anything."

"Sure…" said the long-haired man, immediately dismissing the woman's offer from his mind. He didn't want to deal with her more than he absolutely needed to.

Seeming satisfied with his response, she turned her attention onto the large man still standing behind her in the hall, who seemed rather uncomfortable to be at her focus. Quickly she strode across the hall, pushing another door open and motioning into the room revealed on the other side. "You can stay in this room. It has a larger bed that I think you'll find more comfortable to sleep on, and I thought you might prefer having a room to yourself too."

Glancing quickly through the open door and giving a small nod, he said, "It is adequate."

Mrs. Briefs beamed up at him as though he'd just said it was the most exquisite place he'd ever seen, and he again wondered if it might be wiser to retreat from this woman. "Ah, but I should let you gentlemen get settled in for the evening. Besides, I still need to get dinner ready for my family."

Turning away from them, she pranced off down the hall, humming lightly to herself. An awkward silence followed in her wake with both of the older men staring after her retreating form with expressions that seemed to ask just what they'd gotten themselves into. "Are all of the people on this planet like her?" asked Raditz with a note of apprehension in his voice as he glanced over at his brother.

"No, I don't think so."

"You 'don't think so'?"

He shrugged his shoulders unconcernedly. "Well, I never met any other people like her. Most people on this planet are generally nice, but they don't get as friendly as she does."

Both men seemed to visibly relax at that.

"Why are you scared of her?"

"I'm not _'scared'_ of that woman!" shouted Raditz indignantly, lunging forward almost as though he intended to attack the boy, but he stopped suddenly, catching himself before he could go through with it. Pressing his lips together tightly, he pulled back with a huff. "There's just something wrong about her."

Walking into the doorway of the room, Nappa said, "It is partially due to our nature and our conditioning. As a people we are very reserved around those we do not know, so her overly familiar and affectionate behavior is completely at odds with our own natural behavior. Even so, we could adapt to it easily enough if we were not so heavily conditioned to be distrustful of such overt friendliness. There is no room to trust others in space."

"But you guys trust each other," said Goku, brows furrowing in question.

Didn't they trust each other? He knew that Vegeta must trust them at least if he was willing to bring them to Earth with him. He knew the other Saiya-jin well enough to understand that he wouldn't have taken that sort of risk with people whose loyalties he had any doubt of.

Crossing his arms over his massive chest, Nappa gave a small snort. "We are not others amongst ourselves."

"Huh?"

"We don't split ourselves up as one person against the whole rest of the universe," explained Raditz, taking pity on his brother's failure to understand. "That's just too much for anyone to take on."

"We divide ourselves up into groups, and anyone outside of your particular group is a part of the 'others' I was talking about," said the large man, taking the conversation back. "Many people choose to group themselves by race since they already share some amount of commonality, but there is any number of other ways for them to do it. It doesn't really matter so much about why you've put yourself together with them so long as you have at least one person you can trust. There's no more dangerous place to be than alone."

"Oh. I think I get it now," said Goku with a small nod of his head.

"You should. You're more a part of Prince Vegeta's group than we are."

He blinked, eyes widening in surprise at that statement. "What? No. You guys got it wrong there. You're his group. I'm just the 'third-class clown' he puts up with because I make a decent sparring partner in the future. You know him way better than I ever could."

"What kind of a joke is that?" asked Raditz with a smirk as he plopped down on one of the beds. "We don't know the runt at all with the way he is now. Sure, he looks the way we know him, but he doesn't act the way we know."

"You were the first person he sought out after arriving on this planet."

"He probably just thought I was the most likely person to remember too. It doesn't really mean anything," said Goku with a shrug.

Nappa shook his head, wearing a dismissive expression. "He trusts you. Do not underestimate what that means for someone coming from his situation." Turning away from them, the large man departed to his room across the hall, closing the door behind him.

…

The door opened, and Vegeta's eyes slid slowly over to it, watching with an expression of the greatest disinterest as Dr. Briefs entered again, walking towards his bed with that familiar, slow shuffle. With a sigh, he turned his face away, looking out of the large window in his room, out of which he could see the tall, looming shapes of the city skyscrapers beyond the boundaries of the Capsule Corp property, backed by the quickly darkening sky. The dark forms of the buildings were dotted with many tiny squares of light spaced out randomly over them in an ever-changing but always senseless pattern.

His own room was dimly illuminated by the single lamp sitting atop the bedside table. One of the nurses had turned the overhead light off on her way out the door, saying that he needed to go to sleep early in his state and at his age—she had absolutely refused to believe that he could be any older than seven. He'd turned the lamp on almost as soon as she'd shut the door just to be defiant.

"How are you feeling?" asked the man as he came to stand at the bedside.

"Like a building dropped on top of me before I was beaten and nearly disemboweled," he answered in a deadpan tone.

"Well, you certainly looked the part when you first arrived," said the scientist, obviously not believing him. It would've been infuriatingly frustrating if he hadn't been expecting it. "I know you must be tired by now, but I was wondering if I could ask you some questions."

"I stopped answering questions earlier. Why do you think I'll start again now?"

Allowing a sigh to slip between his lips, Dr Briefs said, "I don't necessarily assume that you will, but I would like to ask them regardless. However, if you are absolutely set against that, I will simply leave and let you be for the rest of the evening."

Looking back at the man, he tilted his head slightly to one side, seeming to consider it for a minute. "Do what you want."

Seeming pleased and mildly surprised with how well that had turned out, Dr Briefs sat down in the chair that still stood at his bedside. "Good. Now, are you really as old as you claimed to be when you were speaking with my daughter earlier?"

"Yes."

"Do you realize what that implies when your…size is taken into account?"

"Yes."

"Do you have anything to say on the matter that might explain why you seem so undersized for your age?"

"You're judging me by human standards, but those standards would not necessarily apply to me if it turned out that I wasn't human." He paused for a moment, watching the man's expression with an expression of feigned disinterest. His eyes watched every movement of the man's face, gauging his thoughts. "You already considered that idea, of course. After all, humans don't have tails."

"So what are you?"

He frowned, turning his face to gaze up at the ceiling. "I am a Saiya-jin."

The man frowned, scratching his chin lightly as he seemed to think over something. "I've never heard of that people before. Can you tell me more about yourself and your people?"

"It doesn't matter. The four of us you've already seen make up the entirety of what remains of my people. The rest are gone."

Bushy eyebrows shot up over the rim of his glasses, and for a long moment Dr Briefs seemed uncertain of whether to further pursue this line of questioning. It should be a highly sensitive subject, but the boy seemed completely detached from it. Perhaps he'd been too young to really remember it, or maybe he'd simply never been allowed the opportunity to deal with the event. Either way, it screamed for him to delve further into the subject. "What happened to them?"

"They were killed. I was intentionally left alive. A few others managed to escape it as well, but they were mostly just lucky."

"Is that what you're going to wish for?"

Dark eyes snapped back to look at the man again, narrowing in a silent demand for an explanation.

"Bulma told me about these dragonballs you're searching for."

"Blabbermouth," he grumbled with a huff.

The doctor either didn't hear him or simply chose to ignore his remark. "As a scientist, I have to say that such things as magic, wish-granting stones sound like silly children's tales, but you say that you have personally witnessed their power. I wonder, however, if you saw what you really think you did and not some much more mundane occurrence."

His face set into a familiar scowl. "They work! I _know_ they do."

Dr. Briefs frowned, looking at him, really looking at him, examining his appearance and his words. "I see," he said after a moment. "You were the one brought back to life."

Unconsciously he reached up to grasp his chest.

Since when was the man this perceptive? Had there simply been a time before the founder of Capsule Corp had been such an absent-minded, eccentric doddering around in his lab and too consumed in the various odd projects he found interest in to really pay attention to the world around him.

"Nobody ever wished me back to life," he said, looking away again, staring back out of the window. That was technically true, at least. Both of the times he'd come back to life, no one had specifically wished for his resurrection. His revival had always been as a side-effect of the larger wish. On Namek, he'd simply happened to be one of those killed by Freeza, and in the fight again Buu, he'd just happened to be judged as a 'good' enough person to fit inside the parameters of that wish.

"What happened?" asked the man, glancing momentarily down at the boy's hand fisted furiously in the fabric of the hospital garment.

Images flashed in his mind. He saw the green sky of Namek and a pair of dark lips twisted in a sadistic smile. He saw the flash of light as the attack pierced his body and his vision slowly dimming to nothing as he reached out towards a blurred orange and black figure.

A shudder ran down his spine as he remembered the utter sense of hopelessness he'd felt then. That same feeling began to seep into him yet again at the terrifying knowledge that although his own power was so much smaller due to his youth, Freeza's was completely undiminished. If he found them now, they were dead. They would be dead if they were lucky, at least.

"I'm not answering any more of your questions," he said with a note of finality that refused to be swayed.

"I'll leave you be," said Dr. Briefs in a resigned tone. There was a shuffling noise as the man stood from his seat, and began to walk back towards the door. More light spilled into the room as he opened the door leading into the well-lit hallway. "Sleep well, and try not to do anything to aggravate your injuries."

The room grew dim again, and the door closed back with a click, signaling the man's departure. Vegeta scowled, curling slightly into himself and cursing silently.

* * *

_Thanks to Jombra, Kiomori (Well, keep in mind that they're probably used to Vegeta being a bit of a manipulative bastard when the situation calls for it. He's not doing anything particularly unusual for himself in this instance.), hopelessly_demented (They may meet up with a few other canon characters in their search for the dragonballs, but I won't say which ones. You should be able to figure out one or two if you happen to have access to the original manga. Some of those balls will be in their same locations.), XxKuroyoxX (Mrs. Briefs was rather fun to write, but she would probably creep me the hell out in real life.), Whatev3691 (You'll have to wait another chapter at least to get to the dragonball hunt, but I'm looking forward to it a bit myself.), mynameisthedoctor, GCTIGERFAN1, kitsuk8 (Well, this chapter is largely talking too, but I don't think it's particularly good. Still, I hope it turned out okay. It's a further pause that just sort of seemed to need to happen.), j (Heh…so much for being on time, eh?), xzavx (Well, I didn't give much indication of whether they liked her cooking or not, but you can probably just go ahead and assume that they did.), xXoTaInTeD-bLoSsOmoXx, Stiehl (We'll get to his reasons eventually. It's just hard to slip all of that in without going into straight out exposition mode.), GoldenKitsuneHime13, Mirai Veggie, Vegetachik7 (Ah, I remember your story. Post-Buu Vegeta is interesting and can be a bit tricky to write well, I think. I've read where some people have him hardly changed from what I would categorize as more of a Cell-era characterization, and I've seen others that have him being completely at peace with his past and himself. Personally, I think he'd in some ways be even more conflicted about his past after the changes he underwent over the Buu arc.), Creampuff, Tensai-chan (Oh, there are way better writers than me on this site. Check out some of the stuff by Kizmet and balthezarian for some really good writing.), JollyVenturer, and Cyde (Oh, I have some plans for the dragonballs, but I'm not necessarily planning on using them in the typical way.) for reviewing. Next time we should make some actual progress in the story._


	15. Chapter Fifteen

_Things got so hectic at the end of the semester, and for some reason, they didn't calm down even once I got out on winter break. Of course, they picked up even more once the new semester started. Sorry I wasn't able to update sooner._

_Somehow, one of my professors managed to draft me into helping him with his new book. It's about Baptists in Romania. I've been doing proofreading/copyediting for him, and for some reason that I'm still not entirely sure of, I offered to continue helping him with it even once the semester was over. Maybe I made the offer because I knew how much work he still had left to do on it and figured it'd be a lot easier to have the same person keep working on it instead of bringing someone new in to finish up. Also, maybe I offered because he said I was good at it._

_I also had to work on getting ready for my senior thesis. I'm writing a comparative study of comics and manga from a certain time period and what social issues they address. Yeah, it sounds pretty nerdy, but it's something that not a lot of research has been done on before. I still have to find a bunch of new primary sources since my original plan was much too broad._

_Yeah. This means that updates for this semester will probably be pretty limited as well, but I am still working on the story. I am determined to finish it this time!_

_Also, yes, I got distracted by my new crack, Axis Powers Hetalia (or Hetalia: Axis Powers if you prefer). It's world history as humor, and as a history major, this is seriously like a drug designed specifically for me. It is awesome!_

_Since this chapter's so late, I tried to make it nice and long._

* * *

**Chapter Fifteen**

He walked slowly down the dark hallway, footfalls muffled by a thick, plush layer of carpet over the floor. There was no one awake to bother him now. He was free to roam the halls as he pleased at this late, solitary hour of the night.

It was driving him mad!

All of the humans kept insisting that he should stay in bed until he was further recovered from his injuries, and Nappa and Raditz were encouraging them out of some morbid sense of amusement. The forced inactivity left his body almost literally aching, demanding for motion and movement, and it left him in an especially foul mood. To help alleviate some amount of his pent-up energy and the worst of his temper, he'd taken to doing some basic exercises like crunches and push-ups when no one else was around, and these late-night walks afforded him some small change in scenery that helped relieve some tiny bit of the boredom that was threatening to crush his already tenuous grip on sanity.

Pausing for just a moment, he flexed his left arm—now thankfully free of the shoulder immobilizer—carefully. It was annoying; the doctors were being overly cautious about him. Yes, they were still a bit worried about him doing something to re-injure himself, but they were becoming more concerned over his recovery rate.

It was too fast.

There was no logical explanation they could come up with for how he was recovering so quickly, and it left them worried that they must have missed something. All of their tests and examinations showed that he had made almost a month's worth of healing in less than a week. Even more perplexing to them was that areas like his shoulder showed none of the usual signs of a serious injury. There was no lingering damage to the nerves or weakening of the ligaments and tendons of the joint. If anything, everything seemed stronger for the injury.

As amusing as it was to watch them sit there and scratch their heads in utter confusion, he would much rather they simply accept what they were seeing and cease their constant hovering about him. He was tired of it.

"What are you doing out here?"

Looking up, he was slightly surprised to see Bulma standing in front of him in the darkened hall. She was wearing a pale green nightgown that hung just below her knees, and her blue hair hung down past her shoulders in loose curls as it relaxed from the braid she wore it in during the day. It seemed that he'd only really known her with shorter hair. That was the person he remembered; that was the person who remembered him.

A part of him wanted to grab that hair and cut it short. He wanted to see that Bulma, his Bulma. He didn't want to see this girl who looked at him as a stranger.

Slowly, one of his hands began to reach out, touching a stray blue curl that hung away from the rest of her hair. He wrapped it loosely around his index finger, running his thumb slowly over the soft strands.

Why didn't she remember? For that matter, why did he remember? Was there a reason why certain people maintained their memories while the vast majority had turned back in mind as well as body? It seemed far too coincidental that other than the person actually responsible for the time shift, the only other person he'd met so far who also remembered the future was his fellow Earth-dwelling Saiya-jin. There had to be some reason why they remembered when almost nobody else did.

Her hand reached up, touching his wrist, and his half-lidded gaze slid over to meet her eyes. They were wide, looking at him confused and questioning, and maybe there was even a touch of fear in them.

Quickly he removed his hand from her hair, bringing the arm stiffly to his side as his gaze fell on the floor. "Don't."

"What?"

"Don't look at me like that." She wasn't supposed to be afraid of him. It wasn't right.

"What are you talking about? Is it impossible for you to make any sort of sense?" She sounded more irritated than anything else now. It was familiar enough. Dark eyes slowly rose back up to look at her again. "You didn't answer my first question."

"Walking," he answered shortly.

"Obviously," she retorted with a snort and a roll of her eyes. How many times had she made that expression of annoyance during the time they'd known each other?

His hands clenched into fists, resisting the sudden urge to reach out and grab her, pull her close, hold her tight. Why couldn't she have remembered too? Why?

"You shouldn't be out of bed yet," she said, glancing away from him abruptly, wearing that uncertain expression again. His hands relaxed, and his eyes drifted slowly to stare at a point just to the side of her face, staring down the dark hallway. "The doctors said you haven't finished healing yet."

"They don't know what they're talking about when it comes to me," he said in a flat tone. Why did it have to be this way?

"You're just being stubborn again. It'll serve you right when you rip yourself open again."

Vegeta opened his mouth to say something back, but he paused as he saw a bright flash of light behind her.

Suddenly the world around them erupted in a deafening, blinding explosion. He reached out, trying to grasp the girl and protect her from the power of the blast, but his hand met only with empty air. He called out her name, but the sound of his voice was drowned out by the roar of the explosion so that even he couldn't hear it.

Finally the noise faded into silence, save the ringing in his ears, and the blinding light gave way to thick, dark smoke that was slow to clear and choking to breathe. He coughed and gagged from the dust in his throat, calling her name again once he'd managed to clear it. Only silence answered him.

"Bulma?" He squinted through the thinning smoke, worried now. His eyes widened suddenly, and his stomach dropped into his feet.

Lying amongst some large chunks of rubble, in a bloody tangle of limbs, was the girl. Her head was hanging at an awkward angle, and her eyes were staring sightlessly up into the night sky, made hazy by dust and smoke. A thin trickle of blood leaked out from the corner of her mouth, dripping from her chin and staining her nightgown. "No…"

A chill ran down his spine as a cold, derisive chuckle rang out through the night air. He knew that laugh. He would recognize it anywhere. Looking around, a cold feeling of dread rose up in his chest, threatening to strangle him right there, and his entire body began to tremble.

"Silly little monkey." He spun around, and there stood Freeza, perched lightly atop a chunk of rubble that bore a portion of the familiar Capsule Corp logo stamped on its surface. Dark lips twisted into a smile, but his red eyes were completely devoid of humor. "Did you really think that you could escape from me so easily? You belong to me."

"I don't belong to anyone!" he shouted defiantly. It was all he had.

The tyrant's image seemed to blur for a moment, and suddenly he was standing in front of him, still smiling that mirthless smile. "Oh, Vegeta," he sighed, placing one hand lightly against the boy's chest. "You should know better by now. Of course you belong to me."

The hand shot up to the boy's face, covering it and clutching his head in a vice-like grip. Nails dug into his flesh, drawing blood, and the fingers squeezed tighter, threatening to crush his skull. He gasped, feeling, hearing the bones in his face beginning to crack. "You will always belong to me."

He opened his eyes, staring up at the still perfectly intact ceiling of his hospital room. There was no smoking pile of rubble. Bulma wasn't lying dead in her own blood. Unfortunately, as much as might wish otherwise, there was still a Freeza, and he was still a very real threat. No amount of simple wishing was going to be able to get rid of that, but at least he wasn't here.

"Another nightmare?" asked a voice from over by the door.

"Shut up, Kakarotto," he growled, rolling onto his side, turning his back towards the door and the younger boy.

"That's the third one," persisted Goku. He had discovered the other Saiya-jin was having nightmares when he'd woken up, sensing rather unusual fluctuations in his ki level, and gone to investigate it. He'd found Vegeta tossing violently in his sleep, waking a minute later in a cold sweat and with panic in his unfocused gaze. It was the most unguarded he could recall ever having seen the other look.

"I told you to shut up about it." Fourth, actually, but who was counting? "My dreaming habits are nobody's business but my own."

"You were saying her name."

He flinched at that statement, pulling his knees up to his chest. The message was clear. It wouldn't remain only his business if any of the humans who were forever coming in to check on him were to hear him muttering her name in his sleep.

"It sounded like something bad happened."

"Drop it!" he ordered, sitting up abruptly and turning to glare at Goku, who looked unphased by it as usual. His tail lashed angrily as though in warning. "Just leave it alone. I meant it when I said that this isn't anyone else's concern, and that includes you."

"But aren't you worried about suddenly having nightmares?"

"No," he answered in a deadpan voice. He didn't have to wonder why he was having nightmares now. It was Dr Brief's fault. The man had made him think about the true danger he was putting himself and everyone else into and had reminded him of just how powerless he was in comparison to the Ice-jin tyrant.

Sighing heavily, he caught his tail in a light grip and began to stroke the tip gently, trying to calm himself. His scowl deepened slightly as his fingers ran over the fur, remembering Bulma's remark over the softness of it. Begrudgingly, he was forced to agree with her assessment.

It had always been that way, he recalled. Even as an adult, his fur had always been very soft—"fuzzy" as Freeza had mocked him on occasion—causing him some amounts of embarrassment. Typically, only cubs were supposed to have fine, plush fur, which was replaced with coarser hair as they became adults. For some reason, his had never made the change.

"Nightmares are just dreams. As unpleasant as they are, they're not real, and there's no deeper meaning behind why I've started having them now. It's this forced inactivity allowing my mind to become restless that's the problem," he said, allowing his tail to slip out of his grip. "I need to train."

Pushing himself to the edge of the bed, he hopped down and walked over to a small closet situated within a set of cabinets against one wall. He opened the door, pulling out a new set of clothes that Mrs. Briefs had insisted on getting for him to replace the ruined ones he'd arrived in. They were much the same style as his previous attire except that the new oversized T-shirt was stamped with the colorful image of some popular—he assumed as much anyway—cartoon character along with some inane catchphrase printed in large, bold letters across the front.

At least it wasn't pink.

"I didn't think you'd actually stick to bed rest this long."

He snorted, pulling the thin hospital gown off and beginning to dress himself. It was nice to get back into real clothes. "Don't be ridiculous. Do you really think that I would just lie around, doing nothing for five days straight? No, I've been doing some basic exercises when no one else was around to bother me over it, but I need a real workout."

Tilting his head slightly to one side and frowning, Goku asked, "How're you going to do that? You don't have the gravity room yet, and no one's really strong enough to be a very good training partner."

"I managed to train before the gravity room, and I've been without decent partners before as well," said Vegeta as he slipped his tail through a newly created hole in his shorts and wrapped it around his waist. He needed to get back in the habit of keeping it like that again.

"Are you sure you're healed enough for it?"

"What kind of stupid question is that?" growled Vegeta, spinning around to face the younger boy. He pointed a finger emphatically at a pale line running across his bare abdomen. "Does this look 'recovered enough' to you?"

"Yeah, yeah. I was just asking," he said, raising his hands in a placating gesture. "You know everyone else is going to give you trouble about being outside and especially if you start training."

"Do you think I really care?" he asked dryly as he pulled the shirt on over his head.

"You care about some of them."

"That was a rhetorical question—especially the part about you thinking," he said, walking over to the large window in his room.

"Hey!" exclaimed Goku as he realized he'd been insulted. "That's not nice."

Looking down into the back yard where Nappa and Raditz were doing some light sparring, Vegeta allowed himself a small smirk. "Since when has anyone ever used the word 'nice' to describe me?"

Placing one hand on the back of his head and giving a small laugh, he said, "I guess you've got a point…though I have heard Bulma use 'nice' to describe parts of you."

A red blush instantly stained his cheeks, and he bit back an angry curse aimed at that woman and her infuriating love of embarrassing him. He would need to pay her back once they finally managed to return time to normal. "Sh-shut up, you idiot! You're the last person I want to hear things like that from!"

Waiting until his face ceased burning, he pushed the window open and jumped up onto the ledge. He glanced outside, making certain that he wouldn't be dropping into any shrubbery or other plant-life. He'd learned to always check after one time where he'd ended up tangled in a large rose bush. It had taken him nearly an hour to pluck all of the thorns out of his hide, but he'd fared better than Mrs. Briefs' beloved roses.

Seeing that he was clear, he dropped down onto the ground outside, using his ki to slightly cushion his landing. He cast a glance back over his shoulder a he heard a scuttling, shuffling noise and saw the younger boy climbing out of the window as well. Turning back around, he walked off across the lawn towards the other two men.

Goku hopped down and broke into a quick sprint to catch up with Vegeta. "Are you okay? You still seem a little flustered?"

A faint hint of pink spread over his face. "Are you doing this on purpose? Every time you open your mouth today, you say something that makes me want to throttle you."

"I didn't mean anything by it," he said in an almost apologetic tone. The sincerity was infuriatingly genuine. "But you know, you're the last person I would've expected to get so easily embarrassed about stuff like that."

"Shut up!" he snapped back as he felt his face beginning to burn hotter. This was no way for him to be seen. "Moron…"

"I am not!" objected Raditz, becoming distracted from his match just long enough to receive a punch from the larger man that sent him skidding over the grass. He groaned as he slid to a stop.

Nappa frowned, lowering his fists and relaxing his stance slightly. "Are you sure about that? You're too old to let your focus keep slipping so easily."

One arm suddenly rose up, blocking a foot as it swung at his head. His dark eyes shifted, looking at the boy still hanging in midair with his leg extended and an amused smirk on his lips. "I'm going to assume you haven't been cleared for release by the doctors yet."

"Doctors guess. I know when my body is recovered." He lowered his leg and came at the man again, throwing a series of punches at him. "Now I have all this pent up energy, and I need something to spend it on."

"So you came to spar," he said, grunting as he caught one of the boy's fists in his massive hand.

Pulling his hand free, Vegeta's smirk seemed to twist into a slightly more predatory expression. "Of course, and aren't you curious to see how my style's changed? It won't be like what you remember from me."

Glancing briefly over at Raditz, who'd regained his feet a minute ago, Nappa asked, "Two against one?"

"Three, if Kakarotto wants to jump in too."

Nappa's brows furrowed and his jaw shifted in a moment of uncertainty as he glanced over at the youngest member of their group. Without the scouter, he couldn't tell the boy's battle power—he mad a mental note to have Vegeta teach him that sensing technique at some point—but he remembered watching as the boy dropped out of the sky, having exhausted his ki trying to lead them to West City. He couldn't have very much power. It would be all too easy to accidentally injure the boy, and that would only slow them down more.

Opening his mouth to state his opinion on the matter, he was quickly cut off as the prince stated, "He is a Saiya-jin too. Do you think that you can really stop him from fighting?"

"Fine," huffed Nappa, making a show of appearing appropriately irritated. "Let the runt risk his neck if he wants."

"It's three against me then. Let's see if any of you can even land a decent hit," he boasted, looking at the others. His eyes paused on Goku for a moment. "Don't expect me to hold back so much on my strength this time."

"You know I wouldn't," he responded casually. It was their usual sort of verbal exchange.

"Of course."

That seemed to be taken as some sort of cue as Nappa and Raditz suddenly attacked. For a few minutes they traded light blows, testing each other's style and ability, renewing the lapsed familiarity between them. Quietly, Goku stood back, watching the trio engage. He didn't really understand it, but he knew that this part was not for him to join in on.

There was a momentary pause in the action, and he could almost sense something in the atmosphere between them change. It was getting serious now. An eager grin spread across his face as he raced towards the group, diving in as they began fighting again.

For a good hour they fought, sparing little energy to snark back and forth at one another but thoroughly enjoying themselves just the same. Although he was easily stronger than the other three even when fighting together, it had been quite a while since Vegeta had been involved in any sort of extended combat against multiple opponents. It required him to have a greater range of focus than he'd become used to, but his ki sense was certainly of benefit to him. Even in the instances he became too focused on one of them, he never completely lost track of the others.

"Oh my!" Their fighting screeched to a halt at the sound of that exclamation.

Mrs. Briefs stood in the back yard, holding a large watering can and staring at them with an expression that seemed astonished but was difficult to read due to her closed eyes. Regardless, the fight was effectively over.

"What're you all fighting about? Is something wrong?"

"No," answered Nappa, swallowing his discomfort at dealing with the woman. "There is nothing wrong. We were only having a mock fight. It wasn't anything serious."

She smiled at them again, accepting the answer easily. "Well, that's quite a relief. I was worried that you might've gotten into a disagreement about something from the way you were fighting."

"Our practice looks serious to those who don't know better."

Nodding her head, the woman walked over to a nearby flowerbed and knelt down onto the grass, staring down at the plants for a long moment. "That makes sense, I guess. I mean, I don't know anything about fighting, so a punch or a kick always looks like something serious to me, and you were all ganged up on poor, little Vegeta—" Raditz snorted and began laughing quietly, but he was quickly silenced as the prince gave him a swift kick to the stomach. Gasping and gagging, he sank down onto his knees, clutching his midsection. "It made me worry that he might've been trying to run away again."

"I don't run away!" he snapped almost reflexively.

The woman just smiled absently as she reached into the flowerbed. She pulled her hand back a few moments later, clutching a fistful of dead plant material. Her mouth pulled into a rare frown. "Oh, I just don't understand it. I'm doing everything just the same as I always do, but my gardens just keep getting worse."

Brows furrowing thoughtfully for a moment, Vegeta glanced around at the backyards, for the first time taking real note of its condition. The flowerbeds were surprisingly sparse, and the grass beneath their feet had acquired a decidedly unhealthy brown color. The trees and larger shrubs seemed to be suffering similarly as well. The grass he might've been willing to dismiss as a product of seasonal change—not that he was entirely certain which season they were currently in—but the trees were certainly strange. If they'd been changing due to the seasons, the leaves would have been turning red, orange, and yellow rather than this dull, dingy brown.

"Kakarotto."

"Yeah?"

"I noticed this when we met up with you, but I didn't think anything of it then. The grass there was yellow and dead-looking," he said in a thoughtful tone as he looked at the younger boy. "What season is it?"

"Um…" Goku pursed his lips for a moment, looking briefly skyward before shrugging his shoulders. "I don't really know, but it feels kind of like early fall or mid-spring maybe."

He grunted, mentally criticizing himself for having thought he could expect better than that from the brain damaged Saiya-jin. "Woman," he called, drawing back slightly in discomfort as he addressed Mrs. Briefs. "What month is it?"

Looking up from her flowers, she smiled again and answered, "It's August, dear, and you don't need to address me that way. You can call me Mrs. Briefs if you want, or you could even call me 'mom' if you preferred that. I heard about your parents, so feel free to think of me as a second mother while you're staying here."

"I would _not_ prefer that, woman," he responded sharply. With a huff, he turned abruptly and stalked away from her.

"Oh… Did I say something wrong?"

The two men traded helpless glances as Goku sprinted off after the other boy. What could they really say on the matter?

"Hey, Vegeta! Wait up! There's no need to be so mean like that."

"Don't lecture me."

Sighing resignedly, he asked, "So why're you suddenly so interested in what time of year it is?"

"Look around," said Vegeta, halting but not looking back. "Does it look like August? Does it feel like August?"

"No, not really."

"There's something wrong. I'm starting to get an idea of what that guy might be up to, but it doesn't make sense why he'd go to the trouble of shifting time for something like that."

"What?" asked Nappa as he and Raditz came up to them as well. "What's he doing?"

He looked back over his shoulder, glancing up at them before saying, "I think he may be a harvester."

"A what?"

"Are you serious?" asked the long-haired man. "What would someone like that be doing all the way out here? There are plenty of other planets he could go to that aren't so far out in the frontier."

"Do you think I don't know that?"

"The planet does seem to show some of the signs of being harvested," commented Nappa as he looked slowly around at the environment as well. Even lacking familiarity with the normal appearance of the planet's native vegetation, he could still see the unhealthiness of it. "We haven't seen enough of the planet to know for certain though. It could just be a phenomenon in these places only."

"We'll be able to find out for certain once we leave to find the dragonballs."

"What's a harvester?" asked Goku, looking back and forth between the others with a curious and somewhat confused expression. It was another reminder of just how isolated—sheltered some might try to argue—he'd been on this planet. There was so much he really didn't have a clue about. "You guys make it sound like a bad thing."

"It is," answered Vegeta flatly, but he offered no further explanation. He was becoming quite tired of explaining things to people.

Taking the silence as a cue, Nappa said, "They're world destroyers of a different kind than those like us. Harvesters go to planets that are not claimed by the Kold Empire of the Federation and steal their energy, leaving them dried-up, dead rocks incapable of supporting life."

"Why do they do that?"

"The collected energy is processed and refined into power cells that are then used by interstellar ports and weigh stations that have no natural ability to sustain themselves. They're illegal, of course. According to Federation mandate, all stations are supposed to use energy cells that are produced synthetically, but many feel that real energy is better quality."

"So he's trying to kill the planet? We have to stop him!"

Vegeta snorted, the corner of his lips twitching in faint amusement. Predictable. "We can't do much of anything so long as we can't find him."

"But—"

"The planet isn't dead yet, Kakarotto. Drawing off a planet's energy is not a quick process, and he won't want to make another big time shift before he's done with the job." A grim smirk played over his mouth. "For now, we have time."

…

Opening, his eyes, he wasn't immediately certain of what had woken him. He blinked a couple of times, taking note that the room was still dark except for the slats of light coming in through the window blinds. It was definitely still night. He felt as though he couldn't have been asleep for more than a couple of hours.

"Raditz, are you awake?"

Grunting, he mumbled, "I am now." He rolled over, looking through sleep-hazed eyes at his younger brother. "What?"

"Um… I was wondering…"

"Yeah?"

"What was our planet like?"

He blinked again, brow furrowing as he looked at the innocently curious face in front of him. "That's what you woke me up for?"

"Yeah. I just started thinking about it, and I wanted to know what it was like."

A curse with no venom behind it slipped out between his lips as he grudgingly pushed himself up into a sitting position. It didn't seem that he was going to be getting back to sleep any time soon. "I'm gonna guess the brat prince was never very talkative about it."

Goku shook his head.

"No surprise," he grumbled, scratching his scalp absently. "He probably doesn't really remember all that much about it anyway."

"Why not?"

He paused, looking down at the blankets that still covered the lower portion of his body. Dropping his hand down into his lap, he looked back up at his brother. "He's not that much older than you, and you were just a newborn when the planet was destroyed. He just wasn't alive long enough to have a whole lot of memories about the planet."

"Oh." He wondered how much Vegeta really did remember. Of course, he never expected that he would actually find out the answer to that. "So what about the planet?"

"It was very different from this planet..." began Raditz, smiling in spite of the fact that it seemed he wasn't going to be getting back to sleep any time soon.

* * *

_I really debated over having the ending scene be with Vegeta or Goku. Obviously I eventually decided on the latter, but that was not without testing a couple of different scenes out first. It just felt like a needed to write a bit more that didn't actually have him making an appearance, and I felt in the mood for a bit of brotherly bonding. I can be a bit of a sap at times, yes._

_First, thanks to everyone who pointed out the missing quotation marks in the previous chapter. Somehow, when I uploaded the chapter all of the quotation marks got deleted. It was definitely not intentional. I usually check my chapters before I post them, but this was, of course, the one time I forgot to do that._

_Thank you to gamegirl07, Kiomori (Yes, the dragonball hunt will be starting soon.), Solitary Hawk, JollyVenturer, divad relffehs, Connor S., Whatev3691 (Yeah. I'd really been thinking that I needed to give the other Saiya-jins some more development.), GoldenKitsuneHime13 (My school is not evil. I'm actually quite fond of my college and professors and classes even. They just sometimes take up much of my time so that I can't get more writing done.), GCTIGERFAN1 (They may find out some things, but I don't want to give everything away.), mynameisthedoctor, Stiehl (I know. Dr. Briefs is supposed to a super genius in his own right, but we only ever really see it in the things he's created rather than in his character. I wanted to give him a bit more depth, but I felt like leaving Mrs. Briefs alone. It's more fun to write her if she's a complete airhead.), supersaiyaman (Well, if you think about it, alternate timelines really must exist. Every time we are presented with a choice, each decision creates a divergent timeline. Basically, every instant creates an infinite number of divergent universes.), darkryubaby, killing u with umbrellas, birdy (Actually, I just deleted all the old chapters and started over from the beginning of the story.), and j. (Sorry. There's no B/V in this chapter. Well, unless you count the bit with Vegeta's dream. I did toy with actually putting some in this chapter, but I decided that I wanted to write some interaction between just the brothers.) for reviewing the last chapter. Sorry about the long wait._


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